The war against the Devils was expected to be arduous. The easy access to living souls was of paramount importance to the Devils, so the Demon Beasts, Spirits, and Humanoids expected harsh retaliation. However, no one thought that the moment the Continental Barriers disappeared, the Angel Realm would attack the Underworld as well.
Because of that, the Devils who were initially coming to the Realm of Gods to defend their territory got confused. Should they go back to the Underworld and fight the angels, or should they stay here and defend their supply of living souls?
Unfortunately, they were not given a choice. As mentioned before, the angels have locked down the Temporal Path. That meant the Devils who arrived couldn't go back, and that also included the Elder Devils. Well, it wasn't like they couldn't use th Temporal Path to reach the Underworld, but that the Angels had mounted a huge defense at its exit.
Angels flocked the Underworld nonstop, making it hard for the Devils to go there. As soon as they appeared in the Underworld, the Angel Army would annihilate them. Even the Elder Devils didn't dare to appear there.
It was truly a surprise attack while they were down. A lot of their top experts were in the Realm of Gods, while the other half was in the Underworld. The Angels, on the other hand, focused entirely on their conquest of the Underworld, putting the Devils on the back foot.
To make things worse, Rui, the leader of the Light Devil Clan, took the Underworld Relic during the last competition and now refuses to help the Devils. The Underworld Relic can't be used against Devils. That's how it was crafted. But just not having to fight an Elder Devil who has it is already an enormous advantage to the Archangels.
It was obvious to everyone that the Light Devil Clan had sided with the Angels for this attack. Still, that was the Underworld. The Angels could pour as much Light Element as they want there. It would never surpass the amount of Dark Element. Not to mention that the entire Underworld was mobilized to stop the angels in their tracks. That caused the war to defend the Underworld to reach a stalemate.
The situation of the Underworld didn't matter to the Demon Beasts, Spirits, and Humanoids, though. Different from the Underworld, the Devils simply had no place from where to take reinforcements. If anything, a lot of the Devils in their armies in the Realm of Gods were deserting every day, with the Devils not being able to do anything about it.
Things didn't get any easier with the expansion of the communication system into their territories. The three races' coordination was simply unmatched. They kept attacking from countless different fronts while being able to keep track of every army and their commanders movements. There were simply not enough Thoughts Transmission Talismans for the Devils to keep up with such a barrage.
Sure, they quickly understood that the Realm of Gods' main strength lay in their communication system. That said, the Elder Devils in the Realm of Gods went out and captured some of the Formations Masters that were tasked with building relay towers. They always had many experts defending them, but there was no way they could protect against Elder Devils.
With that, they acquired quite some information on how the communication badges worked. Unfortunately, they could not replicate the communication system. That's because the formations masters that were sent into the Devil's Territories were only aware of how to build the towers. None of them had any idea how the communication system itself worked.
That was quite obvious. After all, the core of the communication system was still inside the Demon Beast and Humanoid Territories. To be more specific, they were located inside the Dragon Race Ancestral Land, being overseen by Qia and in the Rambram Sect in the Humanoid Territory, overseen by Havek.
All the communication of the system was received, processed, and sent forward in those two places. The number of DPUs they made for this task alone had already surpassed the thousands. It looks like a lot, but one must not forget that the system was already working several decades ago when the twins left. Technology is something that evolves faster than anything else, so such a huge expansion was to be expected.
Besides, there has never been a better stimulus for quick development than war. In this case, the cultivation universe and Earth were no different. The sides who want to win will always pour as much of their resources into development as possible, forgetting pretty much everything else not related to the war efforts. With unlimited resources, time, and stimulus, how could the communication system not leap many levels of development?
In the end, without access to the Communication System Servers, the Devils couldn't employ the same tactics. Neither the Humanoids nor the Demon Beasts were idiots either. They had always had several Divinity Realm experts around their servers and made sure that the secrets of how to build the Communication System were kept secret.
The Devils already lacked reinforcements to simply defend their positions, which they lost more and more every day. Let alone divert their few Elder Devils to attack the location of the servers. With the formations and experts defending such locations, there was no way they could succeed. If anything, they would only ask to be severely injured or even die.
They also understood that destroying the towers had little effect on the communication system. After capturing the few formations master, they understood that the towers worked like a web. Even if you destroyed one, the information would take other routes through other towers and most likely reach its destination nonetheless.
Still, as much as the communication system made things hard to deal with, nothing compared to the sudden disappearance of the Continental Barriers. That truly made their life hundreds of times worse. Otherwise, the Realm of Gods would never be able to send so many of their experts inside this easily.
Of course, the Devils were still plenty after countless years of domination of the Northeast side of the Realm of Gods. They were on the back foot, but they were far, far from being defeated.
