DXD SI : Chapter 84 : Divine Lightnings & What in the F?! (Patreon)

Disclaimer - I don't own any of the characters appearing in High School DXD or the Anime or the manga whatsoever.

Asgard

–Magdaran Bael–

The tears in space kept on appearing, making him feel like there was no end to them. The tears that were no longer just micro showed him scenes of other realms, all connected to the World Tree, and it just further reinforced his theory of this whole thing being started because he wanted to experiment with the World Tree and present something that would blow away Thor and make him win this stupid competition.

I didn’t want Thor to be blown away by fuck-you tier lightning bolts!

Alas, cursing himself was not going to help in any way. The only way to help Thor right now? It was to make sure that whatever those shadowy tendrils were, they did not reach Thor. It seemed to be their goal, even as he disintegrated hundreds of them, even going so far as to erase the micro tears in space, to make sure that they did not come back the same way.

Alas, whatever the lightning was doing, it was stretching and breaking the space around Thor, resulting in space being breached rather easily by those shadowy tendrils, as they continued to ignore him and lash out at Thor’s lightning clad form, for nefarious purposes, no doubt.

All the while, he had to weather the assault from the lightning bolt as well. While not being attacked directly, even the minor arcs were capable of immense discomfort. It was due to the very nature of the lightning, Divine as it was. He didn’t know what Odin was doing, but he trusted the God, especially when Thor’s life was at stake, so he did as he was told to do. That did not mean the lightning arcs did not irritate him.

Far from being able to actually injure him, the lightning arcs were nonetheless more than capable of disrupting his powers and concentration, stopping him from using the conceptual reading part of his powers to see what in the fuck those shadowy tendrils were. They were just relentless, and he could tell that all of them were from the same type of being, or from the same species, from all the different realms.

The portals were opened from all the other realms, targeting Thor directly for some reason, but he was fairly well read about the Nine Realms, courtesy of Odin giving him generous access to his personal libraries, and thus knew that there were no beings that matched those shadowy tendrils.

Certainly not ones that could withstand having thousands of such tendrils destroyed and still keep coming. It was the space around Thor, he realised. Whoever the beings were, summoning the shadowy tendrils cost them next to nothing. Opening a portal directly in the middle of Asgard, in Odin’s domain, must be the costly part of the equation, and now that the Lightning had gift wrapped them an opportunity, they were not going to waste it.

Ideally, they should be targeting Odin since he was the weaker one and, practically, the lynchpin that held Asgard together, but the shadows probably knew that should Thor survive this test, he would become so strong it wasn’t even funny. Already Thor was powerful enough to end entire factions on his own. He wondered just what level he would reach if/when he came away successfully from this test.

Maybe even match the Hindu Gods?

He shook his head, his hand aimed at the general direction of Thor, using a rapidly moving ball of his Power of Destruction to make sure that every single spatial disturbance was erased before it could finish forming a portal for those shadows. He was having limited success with this tactic, especially since the damned Divine lightning continued to harass him.

It was irritating, yes, but he was also thankful that the lightning was only harassing him instead of outright attacking him and burning him to a crisp. Either that or it forced him to back off and run away. Those were his only options at the moment, and that irritated him to no end, because why was he dealing with the Divine Lightning when he wasn’t even a GOD?!

Unfortunately, the strongest God he knew was nowhere to be seen, having disappeared sometime in the middle of his fight with the shadows, and while he intellectually knew that Odin must be up to something, it nevertheless did not make him feel good, as the constant shocks to his soul from the lightning were making it harder to contain his rage.

He was having to destroy the shadows, protect himself, protect his soul, make sure the spatial tears were gone before they could fully form, and keep a watch over his surroundings, as there was no guarantee that someone like Loki wouldn't take advantage of a golden opportunity like this just to add some more chaos into the mix.

All this while having to stand around knowing that it was his fault that kickstarted all of this. As far as he could tell, Thor’s character wasn't really that explored in the Anime version of DxD, which is what he watched, so he didn't know if this whole lightning fest was going to happen either way or not, but what he could tell was that Thor did not seem the least bit prepared for this, and as the storms above Asgard crackled with sky shaking might, he found himself cursing his decision to introduce that surprise item.

Now, even if Thor came out of this alive, he was not going to touch the World Tree branch with a ten foot Uru pole. This was forever going to—

A flick of his hand, sent out a few balls to take care of the spatial tears around Thor, destroying them with ease, before returning to him. He hid the wince at having to dissipate and leave behind two of his balls of Power of Destruction because the lightning arc reached them, only to turn around, his hand, covered in his power, grabbing the shadowy hand this time, reaching for his head.

He crunched the hand in his grasp before pulling, half focused on securing Thor, half focused on getting this son of bitch out of the portal. His other hand was aimed at Thor, and the other held this hand that was getting incredibly harder to hold onto, as he…..focused.

There!

His eyes sharpened as he reached out with his power, locked onto the specific spatial tear this hand was using to target him, and locked it down with his power, manipulating the spatial characteristic to make sure it did not close on its own, not without his permission. It was a similar thing to what he was dying with his own pocket universe experiment back in the Inner Sanctum.

Increasingly, it was starting to feel that he was no longer holding onto a hand but onto a sleeve, with the hand slipping from the inside. He tried to grab tighter, use his power to try and lock down, only for the lightning to come back around and bite him, forcing his focus to waver, shattering the spatial lock he had instated on the tear in front of him, making the hand and the sleeve pull that much harder.

He gritted his teeth, his cloak of power forming a giant rope that began tying itself around the man’s hand that now felt like a sleeve, holding onto it instead of burning it away. It felt like the shadows would prefer he burn the hand instead of holding onto it.

Apparently, realising they couldn't overpower him from a simple portal, they renewed their assault on Thor, forcing him to take more hits from the Divine Lightning Bolt, making his grasp on the hand slip more and more. It was a dual front battlefield for him, and sadly, it looked like he was losing. 

It was very hard to focus his power when he was getting his soul poked by the damned Divine Lightning. Apparently, with all his training, he had forgotten a very important thing to train resistances for.

It won’t happen again, he vowed to himself. The moment this was over, he was going to get poked in the soul by any God’s weapons, to build up resistance. He couldn't believe that he was waltzing around the world, arrogantly believing himself powerful enough to move about unimpeded, without having something like a toughed up Soul against the weaknesses inherent to Devil kind.

At this point, the hand had all but slipped away, as he was pretty much just holding onto the sleeve, and somehow, he could just imagine the smug expressions on the shadow’s faces, and that just pissed him right off. He couldn’t wait to–

His neck snapped upwards, the word escaping his lips, “No—DIVIDE!” only for the other word to echo all around them.

Vali was floating above them, clad in her Scale Mail, her wings out for the world to see, as she had both her hands focused on Thor, or rather, the spatial tears around him. She was using her Sacred Gear to Divide the spatial tears, turning them from barely big enough to get the tendrils through to inaccessible for the same size tendrils.

Smaller tendrils came rushing through in response, only for a second, “DIVIDE!” to ring around them, halving the size once more, stopping the flow of the tendrils entirely. It didn't come at a cost, however, as Vali, entirely focused on stopping the portals, was grazed by an arc from the Lightning bolt, and the way a whimper escaped her lips made him snarl in rage, as both his hands shot out and grabbed the two edges of the spatial tear, expanding it with sheer strength.

The hand/sleeve combo was now tightly wrapped with his cloak, as he grabbed onto whatever was inside, and just let loose. A flash of purple, followed by a flash of crimson, heralded the activation of his power, as the cloak behind him flared to life, multiplying in size as he pumped massive amounts of his Power of Destruction into the portal, bulldozing through whatever resistance the shadow was capable of putting up in response.

At this point, he didn’t care to know who or what was behind this, or what their goal was in targeting Thor. He just wanted everything to be over soon. And if he couldn't help Thor with the massive Divine Lightning bolt, the least he could do for his unofficial combat teacher was to disintegrate enemies that dared strike at Thor while he was in a seemingly vulnerable position.

Seemingly, because there was no telling what Thor was capable of doing, even right now. It might just be likely that the shadowy tendrils wouldn’t even reach Thor before being taken care of by the sheer energy around them, but they could not risk it, not with Odin’s explicit warning about looking out for them.

He had to—

He blinked, a massive wave of power emerging from seemingly everywhere, forcing the spatial tear to shut itself. The one in front of him snapped shut immediately as he had to yank his hands back. He turned around immediately to assist Vali, as being zapped by the arcs sounded fucking painful, only for that power to snuff Vali’s power out instantly as well, making Vali fall from the sky.

His hand extended towards her, his magic manifesting to catch her, only for that overwhelming power to snuff it out as well, or at least it tried to anyway. His power fought back instinctively, but either way, his concentration broken, he had to jump and catch her before jumping away from the Lightning bolt.

The overwhelming power, whatever Odin had done to use it in such a way, was doing its job and was not only destroying the spatial tears but was also working on removing the massive storm above Asgard. 

The storm fought back with all its might, clearly displeased with the interruption, but Odin’s power was not to be denied, not in Asgard anyway, as Odin forcibly tore the storm apart in a shower of lights right above them.

Enveloping Vali with his power, he winced at her internal injuries before healing them promptly, as a communication request came from Albion.

“She pushed herself. I had to forcibly stop the Juggernaut Drive, as I knew it would just draw more power from the Lightning Bolt.” Albion told him and then promptly fell asleep, the toll of having to interfere with its host's wishes, especially one as strong as Vali, evident.

“Moron,” he muttered before he stood up. Vali’s form healed, but still encased in his power as he floated up and looked all around Asgard, realising that whatever Odin had done, it was not targeted. Every single power signature in Asgard was being suppressed, which meant that Loki was suppressed as well, which was a relief in and of itself.

The Lightning Bolt, no longer fueled by the massive storm above them, was beginning to abate as well, allowing him to finally hear Thor’s roars from within the Lightning Bolt. The roars were….angry? Excited? Triumphant?

He couldn't tell. He hadn’t really seen Thor express many emotions during their spars.

Soon enough, the Lightning Bolt had dissipated to the point that Thor’s silhouette was now visible, with his signature hammer pointed straight up at the sky.

Shaking his head, he smiled as Thor’s roars became more pronounced, followed by a very noticeable surge in power. Power that was not very familiar to him, as with the sound of glass shattering, Mjolnir surged forth and broke the Divine Lightning bolt as if it was made of glass.

The massive presence that was Odin, using up his OdinForce, receded soon after, as Mjolnir fell down from the sky and embedded itself into the soil right next to Thor’s prone form, as his hand flicked, summoning a shield over Thor.

He knew what to do very well after this. Cover the vulnerabilities in his allies.

Next person to protect? Odin.

After that? They could discuss what to do next, alongside finding out what in the fuck just happened.