Epic of Caterpillar

Begudhur, the Demon Demigod of Parasites was slowly devouring the energy of the monsters that spawned around where he hides.

He had taken on the body of one of the strongest monsters that spawned in the lowest floors, Thunder Dragons, but after fighting a large group, he found an exceedingly rare High Thunder Dragon, which he took over, leaving his former host as a mummified corpse as he had already drained all of its Life, Magic, and Soul Energy, although as he did this many times, he slowly felt as if he was not progressing anymore.

"It is no use, in the past, I used to parasitize humans… they were varied and had many powers, many of them were Champions and Heroes blessed by gods… but these monsters at the end are all of the same category and attribute, sooner or later I wouldn't acquire as much power from them… for now, I can only keep increasing my army and wait for the parasitized Elder Dragons that would bring my Clones…" thought Begudhur as he rested into his nest while devouring large amounts of flesh to nourish his new body.

"However, there is still that monster in Floor 100, the Last Boss! If I can take over it, I should be able to strengthen enough… it is supposed to be slightly weaker than the Elder Dragons…" muttered the demon demigod.

The last Boss of Nyzzet's dungeon was the Great Thunderstorm Dragon Tyrant High Overlord, a fearful creature with over one hundred and fifty meters of height, and the strength that could rival an Elder Dragon… but without the intelligence that comes with it.

However, Begudhur was planning to hopefully take over the Elder Dragons first, and then trample over the Boss... Begudhur was unaware that there was a Secret Boss, a trial that only Nyzzet could create.

Nyzzet had still not realized Begudhur's existence, as he was currently… taking a nap. He had been sleeping the whole time that Kireina fought against Begudhur's clones, and after several hours of these events, Begudhur's main body that was inhabiting the High Thunder Dragon body received a strong and painful shock into his mind, which also carried all the information that his clones gathered before… dying horribly.

Begudhur was paralyzed in pain as he shrieked in agony, experiencing the pain of all the smaller clones made with tiny pieces of his soul being devoured.

"Nnnnghh! Unnnggyaaa…! W-What is this?! T-That being… it appeared right before my army?! How could she tell where they were?!" roared Begudhur as his face, that of the dragon, seemed in complete and utter pain while breathing heavily in the ground, like a pathetic lizard.

Begudhur discovered that Kireina was able to completely devour his split souls with ease, to negate most of their Divine Energy charged attacks and also to seemingly strengthen from them… Not only that, but her entire family was made up of misfits with the same aberrant powers.

"She's certainly some kind of powerful goddess that has come to exterminate me… but just how much have the gods in the outside world had advance since my sealing? Are they all capable of eating another god that easily?! The digestion of a God soul should not be incredibly slow? Even with my Divinity, I have calculated how slow it would be to completely assimilate another god's divinity with the 'Divinity Devouring' Divine Technique! Just what kind of incomprehensible creature is this… fairy? It is certainly not a fairy! The way it transforms, the way it commands her pawns, and the way she glanced at my clones… she's a frightful Demon Goddess!"

Begudhur realized how quickly Kireina was capable of devouring his clone's souls and divinities, something that should not be realistically possible within any god…

The concept of devouring other gods was actually completely unheard of, gods would steal each other divinities through fighting and using the 'Divinity Devouring' Divine Technique, but the victim would be left with a body unless the gods possessed some kind of Divine Technique that let them combine with the god that they're trying to steal their power, similar to Begudhur's Parasitism, but not as specialized.

Loner gods would often hunt down other Loner Gods of their similar attributes to steal their Divine Realms by extracting the Divine Core form their Divine Souls and then eating it to add it to their Divine Realm… something that one of the Demon Gods, Thanatos, did against Megusan, stealing his Divine Realm by robbing his Divine Core but still leaving him alive.

After a god had their Divine Core stolen, they would weaken and would not be capable of rising through the god ranks anymore as they would lack their Divine Realm for that task, becoming stagnant in their current Rank.

However, not all gods were compatible with the divinities of each other, so stealing divinities was not as easy. Sometimes the gods' original divinity would reject the new one and end up weakening the god tremendously by backfiring and affecting them… if this were to happen too severely, they would become Fallen Gods unless they were Great Gods or above.

Lone Gods would usually hunt each other to steal their Divine Realms through the Divine Core, so they can either add it to their original Divine Realm if it were compatible with them to increase their power and God Rank, or sell it for exorbitant prices to gods that were compatible with it, gaining a fortune that could be spent in resources to strengthen their Divine Realms through them.

So, no matter if the god was not compatible with one, it was always a win to steal their Divine Cores. Their Divinities would remain, but extremely weakened, and the gods would often fall into a slumber for an eternity to recover and someday grow a new Divine Core or end up falling into Fallen Gods due to the insane decrease in Divine Energy (if they still had a physical body attached to their souls).

Megusan was capable of surviving because he had saved great amounts of Divine Energy even when he was cut into pieces and sealed, and also because his physical body was destroyed, if a god had their physical body destroyed, they would not be able to become Fallen Gods, but they would also weaken just as much than with the Divine Core missing.

Megusan had both the Divine Core and his Physical Body taken from him, he became immune to falling into a Fallen God without a Physical body to mutate and go insane, but he was so weakened that he did not even possess fifty percent of his former powers, Kireina only needed the tools she had at her disposition to devour what remained of his former glory.

This case was similar with Begudhur, his physical vessel was lacking, and his Divine Core was cracked in two due to the Hero that sealed him, making his Divine Realm distorted and damaged, without being of any use for him, although his Divine Core was not stolen or completely destroyed, it was impossible for him to rise through the Ranks as of now, and would have to wait thousands of years for the core to naturally heal.

However, as long as Begudhur could take over a god through his parasitism, this would not matter as his Divinity was unique in the sense that it was compatible with any, as he was a parasite, he would be able to parasitize and take over any host no matter the attribute of their divinity.

This power, the ability that Begudhur possessed was the one that the gods feared so much, if he ever were to one day parasitize a god, he would quickly rise and become unstoppable by stacking divinities and powers one after another…

But it seems that Begudhur already found a being similar to him in Kireina, this is why he was so frightened!

"A being with the same powers as me… that Demon Goddess presence was chaotic… and it also possessed many hints of different affinities within her Divine Aura! This means that she had most likely already 'eaten' other gods before me…!" thought Begudhur, entering in a sudden panic.

By such rules, if he were not careful, instead of parasitizing Kireina, Begudhur would end being the one devoured by her!

"And not only her, but all of her pawns had similar powers… the youngest ones could eat the souls of my clones as well… those were the most frightening of them all! And many if not all of those younglings had divinities similar to Living Deities!" thought Begudhur.

However, aside from the terrible fear, Begudhur also gathered many clues and things.

He heard many times the demi-humans there talk about things regarding… Divinity Devouring Skill?

And there was also something about 'their effects'.

Begudhur was in a small shock, he had no clue what they were talking about… how could it be possible for all of them to possess the Divinity Devouring Divine Technique? They were dozens of pawns and all of them had it somehow, even when it is a very hard Divine Technique to master and even harder to create a Divine Scroll to learn it, the materials for it were too specific and not cheap at all!

"But a skill?" he thought.

What if what they were using was not a Divine Technique… but they had somehow unlocked a Skill that did the same thing as the Divinity Devouring Divine Technique?

"Could it be…?! Then that explains their physical bodies being those of mortals!" said Begudhur, realizing the truth with his incredible perspicacity.

Begudhur, through all the information he gathered, had noticed how the fairy and each of the pawns did not have the usual feeling of a physical god body… the one that he once had.

They felt strange, it was as if their physical bodies were those of a mortal, even if incredibly strong while possessing the souls of Living Deities, with only a six-armed Lamia girl (Nirah) having a soul that smelt like that of a Demigod… while the fairy was the most frightening with a power that seemed to surpass God Rank, but only inside her soul… her physical body still had the scent of a mortal. There were also a few others (Kireina's wives minus Rimuru), whose souls were slightly weaker than a Rank 1 Living Deity, so they were using this 'cheat skill' despite not being in the true realm of gods yet.

"From what I can discern… that fairy is using her special skill to share the effects with those pawns that didn't possess it naturally like the smaller ones," said Begudhur, contemplating the truth about their powers.

Then, a brilliant idea came to him.

"If they have such power… shouldn't I be able to acquire it as well? But what could be the conditions to acquire this skill? A physical mortal vessel, maybe? All of them had it after all! Then, I already have this mortal body, so it should work… then what else? Divinity Devouring… Devouring… Eat Divinity?"

Begudhur smiled.

"That's it!"

Begudhur quickly gathered the strongest of his Parasite Soul Clones that he had at the moment, as many of the others had gone to the High Lizardman Cities to parasitize the Elder Dragons and bring them back to the main body.

"My clones gather here!" he said, with a wicked and voracious smile.

"Yes, main body…"

All of the clones gathered as they sat down and left Begudhur to extract their soul clones.

Instead of trying to assimilate them back into his soul, he opened his gaping mouth and entangled the souls with his tongue.

"Main body?! G-GYAAAAAA!"

"Main body, why are you eating us?!"

"It hurts! Stop! STOOP!"

The only thing that Begudhur's clones could do was to cry I agony and pain, as they were not able to resist his authority… but Begudhur was also in tremendous pain, as he felt the same pain as them through their mental connection.

Each munching of the soul was painful due to him using his Divine Energy into it… although it should not be possible to eat it naturally, it was dealing a large amount of damage into the weaker little clone soul pieces.

"Nnnghh…! I have to try… at the very least!" roared Begudhur, finishing to eat a small Clone Soul, and then he grabbed another one and another one, one after another, he cut them into little pieces with his sharp teeth enhanced with Divine Energy and then gulped them down into his mortal stomach.

As Begudhur continued… he felt a strange power within his physical body.

The munched pieces of Divine Soul began to be… digested.

"Is it… working? Nnggh… Nnggaaahhh!!!"

Begudhur felt as if something was working, but then an even sharper pain came to him as his Divine Soul Clones, who shared his senses, began to be digested and dissolved within his soul and physical body, it was a strange and disgustingly aberrant feeling that even a god of parasites was having agony by experiencing it. It was as if he was being dissolved and eaten.

Begudhur then fell unconscious…

And four hours later, he woke up.

He felt strange. It was as if his whole existence had changed its quality, it was as if a new level of power was attained even when he has not even increased his Rank.

"This power… did I ever had it before? How could I never… realize my true potential?!"

In front of Begudhur, various system windows began to appear one after another.

[Begudhur] acquired the [Divinity Devouring; Level 1], [Self-Devouring Divine Technique; Level 1], and [Self-Parasitism Divine Technique; Level 1] Skills!]

"Divinity Devouring… the Skill! And these two Divine Techniques as well, they complement very well! It is here… I have… attained it! Victory is within my grasp! I shall devour you, and your pawns, Demon Goddess! Thanks for freeing me and teaching me such convenient power! I shall now thank you by savoring your flesh and your soul!" laughed Begudhur, celebrating that the excruciating pain that he suffered had paid its efforts.