DMAW Chapter 93: The Kings In Sin, Part 3 (Patreon)

Through the furnace of her rage, Serafall still felt an unwelcome thread of concern winding through her as she watched the two gigantic dragons stalk their way towards her and the Orobas triplets.

Mountains shook beneath their ancient auras, enormous fractures tore through the frozen earth, and the fabric of space trembled as Níðhǫggr and Lindwyrm Regis’ auras pressed against reality. Every snarl and growl from the Dragons distorted the environment and sent small tremors through the ground, and the air shook with powerful vibrations.

And with that single glance, Serafall became all too aware that Kosara’s barriers wouldn’t be able to contain the powers of the two ancient wyrms. Her Bishop was already supporting hundreds of interlocking boundaries across the surrounding wilds, reinforcing each one whenever a stray attack threatened to break through and bleed into the rest of the Underworld. For all her prowess, Kosara was still Ultimate-class; well into the upper echelons, but still a far cry from a true Satan-class powerhouse. She was already straining herself to contain the Orobas triplets, two armies and a genuine Demon Lord.

But the addition of two powerful dragons out of legends?

Serafall’s mouth twisted as she could already feel the outermost barriers beginning to strain. She absolutely could not afford to allow a full confrontation with the two wyrms to spill out of the barriers – millions would die in an instant.

She let out an angry huff and turned a furious glare back towards the three sisters who were essentially responsible for this mess.

They were still under their conjured shield, and Serafall still had her hand outstretched toward them, pouring waves upon waves of magic to constrict and break down their protections. Though they remained as impassive as ever, she could begin to see a crack of strain within their visible eye – no doubt the three had overestimated themselves and underestimated her.

Still, as far as priorities went, she needed to focus on ending the threat of the Orobas sisters as soon as possible, that way she could focus on the real danger. Those damn dragons.

But she could not do both things at once.

With a flick of her Will and a wave of her other hand, two colossal summoning circles blossomed into existence. Both bore her personal insignia, though one spread over the frozen land below, while the other appeared high in the darkened sky.

A gigantic, clawed arm shot from the lower summoning circle and plunged into the frozen rock beyond its circumference. Talons large enough to encircle houses tore through the mountainside as the creature found purchase and hauled itself into the Underworld, dragging an absolute titan of deep-purple and black hide through the burning pink light. Sheets of ice shattered against its rising bulk while displaced slabs of stone poured from its body in landslides, exposing powerful limbs and a broad torso covered in muscles that rippled beneath its thick, leathery flesh.

The beast planted his second forelimb upon the earth and pulled the rest of himself from the circle. A long, immensely powerful tail followed behind him, its passage scouring a trench through several mountains, while a streak of dense white fur ran from its tip along the length of his spine and ended atop his enormous head. His features possessed the general shape of a bear, though no fur softened his face; dark, leathery hide stretched across a heavy muzzle and a reinforced skull, from which two colossal horns emerged before curving forward like weapons made to impale mountains.

Once fully risen, the creature stood level with the surrounding peaks, his immense frame eclipsing entire valleys beneath its shadow. He lifted his horned head and unleashed a roar that rolled across the continent with enough force to crack the earth beneath his feet and shatter nearby summits into avalanches of ice and stone.

Behemoth, Magical Beast King of the Earth and bearer of two of Serafall’s Rook Pieces.

And he was not alone.

A shrill cry tore across the heavens with enough force to break the sound barrier, and the resulting shockwave ripped through the clouds before striking the earth below.

A gargantuan bird descended through the upper summoning circle, spreading pinions more than a mile wide across the sky and casting an immense shadow over the battlefield. His feathers were a dull golden color, though each possessed a distinct metallic sheen that caught Serafall’s pink light and reflected it in muted flashes across the heavens.

Every beat of those vast wings battered the world beneath him. Hurricanes erupted around his body and raced in all directions, while funnels of cloud twisted down from the sky like violent cyclones and tore across the earth, ripping white forests from their roots and grinding ice and stone into spiraling clouds of debris. The frigid winds Serafall had summoned throughout the region were caught within his dominion and bent around him, becoming part of the immense tempest heralding his arrival.

Ziz, Magical Beast King of the Sky and bearer of four of Serafall’s Pawn Pieces.

The legendary bird wasted little time upon ceremony: with another thunderous beat of his wings, Ziz crossed the distance between himself and the Dragons so quickly that his immense golden form became a streak through the icy clouds. Níðhǫggr had only begun turning toward him when the Magical Beast King descended and raked his talons across the Dragon’s face, the impact snapping its head aside and scattering scales as large as buildings through the air.

Níðhǫggr answered with a ferocious roar, purple fire already boiling between its jaws. A blinding torrent poured across the horizon and swallowed Ziz within an inferno wide enough to consume entire cities, though the Magical Beast King folded one wing and plunged beneath it before the flames could fully engulf him. The breath continued onward and struck Serafall’s frozen dominion, vaporizing nearly a hundred square miles of ice within seconds and reducing the mountains beyond to molten sludge. Steam exploded upward in a searing wall, temporarily blotting out both monsters as they climbed into the upper atmosphere amid fire and cyclonic winds.

Lindwyrm Regis raised its serpentine body from the broken landscape and tracked Ziz through the clouds. Its throat bulged grotesquely as destructive power gathered within its body, its jaws beginning to part as it prepared to assail the soaring beast from below.

But Behemoth released a roar and launched his mountain-sized body into the air with one enormous leap. His shadow swept across Lindwyrm Regis an instant before he crashed down upon the Dragon’s serpentine back, driving it into the earth beneath his full weight. The resulting impact erupted with enough force to vaporize dozens of surrounding mountains and collapse the land into a crater several miles across. Lindwyrm Regis thrashed beneath him, its immense coils tearing through the ground as Behemoth buried his claws in its scales and forced its head away from the aerial battle.

The four monsters waged war across earth and sky, their roars rolling together while every collision altered the landscape. Níðhǫggr pursued Ziz through cyclones and ruptured clouds as purple fire scorched the heavens, while Behemoth and Lindwyrm Regis wrestled through mountain ranges and buried entire valleys beneath avalanches of shattered stone. It was the sort of battle that would have reduced the world to crumbling stone if not for the straining dimensional barriers.  

Serafall gave the four monsters another second of attention before she returned her gaze to the Orobas sisters. Their barrier continued to strain beneath her outstretched hand, and all three stared past her toward the titanic creatures, and finally a hint of uncertainty began overcoming their otherwise cold and expressionless features.

Serafall’s lips curved into a delighted smile.

“Oh, you poor little girls. How deluded are you to think that Leviathan doesn’t have monsters of her own?”

Their faces snapped back towards her, and each flower in the sisters’ right eye quivered in some display of emotion.

“Pointless,” Drei said.

“Inconsequential,” Sechs echoed.

“Your ancient beasts are of note, Serafall Sitri,” Neun said firmly. “But they are not the equals of the ancient Wyrms – their power far outstrips that of even Leviathan of Old’s counterparts.”

Serafall rose a single brow in response. “Just as Leviathan of Now utterly outstrips you three.”

They said nothing in response, but Sera could feel the chill of doubt within their souls. For all their stoicism, they could not hide the primal fear when faced with a Demon Lord.

But she had had quite enough of the three sisters and their invading armies. It was time for her to put an end to all this and suppress the dragons before Kosara’s barriers fully cracked and gave way.

Serafall then tilted her head, a touch unnaturally, and she allowed the Sin of Lust to rise from the darkest depths of her soul. Its presence unfurled from her being with a quiet pulse. And it was not a loud nor boisterous moment, but it was an unmistakable and terrifying swell of power.

Like the ocean at midnight bulging in silence, rising up to swallow the sky.

Serafall Leviathan stained the reality in Sin, dyeing the world in mutant hues of pinks and purples. She supposed, to ordinary eyes, the phenomenon would have appeared alien yet delightful – like a cacophony of colors. As though the world had become liquid beneath some unseen touch.

And a touch it was. A soft caress that left its mark wherever it passed, staining the world with its presence, sinking in and imprinting itself irreversibly.

It slithered outward with sensuous delight, making the air quiver and the frozen earth curl toward her feet. Serafall raised her chin and watched the Orobas sisters stiffen beneath their barrier.

Well, they kept going on and on about the old ways? Shouldn’t she give them a demonstration? After all, it wasn’t in her nature to pass up the chance for a performance.

Lust continued onward, over the mounds of crystalline ice and the harsh bite of the gale – it touched every falling flake of ice and swept through the giant white woods covered with rime. And finally, it came upon the roar of a hundred thousand Devils, all of them entrenched in violence and rage and the wondrous delight for murder all Devilkind held.

She snaked through them, finding each heart that refused her love, and glided into the deepest recesses of their souls.

Her lips curved into a cold smile as she saw strands of pink lights dance within their eyes. She raised one hand and beckoned with a slow curl of her fingers, tugging at their heartstrings.

“Look at me, children. Look at Leviathan.”

Her voice slipped between the sounds of battle as a distorted echo, soft and intimate, reaching every Devil as though Serafall stood directly behind them with her lips poised beside their ears. And instantly the clash of weapons and war faltered, and the countless cries of war dissolved into a sudden hush as faces turned toward her on command.

Leviathan puckered her lips and pouted. She bent forward, and despite the hundreds of miles of falling snow between them, the velvet invitation of her body reached their gazes so easily.

“My dear children, do you see my eyes? Do you not yearn for them to gaze upon you? Do you see my lips? Do you not wish for them to smile for you? Do you see my supple flesh? Do you not wish to hold it soft against you?”

A dark intoxication saturated every spoken syllable, sinking beneath thought and reason to caress and light a private burning. And it was a burning so different than her brother Wrath’s. Hers was an invitation to close the eyes, and in the dark see only her. And all of them, so easily, so eagerly, accepted that invitation.

The army of the Old Empire turned away from her faithful, their weapons clattered far down to the frozen ground below. And many of them even began to slowly drift through the blizzard to find her, abandoning their lines and their comrades.

But not just them; the world itself yearned for her.

What mountains remained bowed subtly in her direction, as though their peaks ached to reach out and touch her. And the frozen earth curled upward, desiring to lick the soles of her feet. Far above, the sky bulged and dipped, like Ouranos of old descending to embrace Gaea. But there was no Heaven in the Underworld – no celestial vault. Only the endless embrace of Leviathan’s touch.

Light curved from its natural path to caress her silhouette and every sound turned around to travel back toward her. Color bled through the air and gathered around her body, eager to dance in worship and devotion. Serafall stood at the center of it all, chin raised and smile deepening, while Lust hollowed her into an absence that nothing could fill.

And she took in a cold breath, tasting a world’s worth of desire in the air, drawing it in and pulling at it until it carried the vitality and essence of all things.

Serafall Leviathan touched her face and smiled madly – she was the center of attention, the writhing dark surrounded by a sea of beating hearts. She was loved, she would be loved – and her affection returned would be radiant and sublime.

For those who obeyed.

She touched all of the rebels, caressing their lips with phantom imprints of her own. Reaching into their very being she said, “But I will only love one.” And a pervasive and malicious darkness wormed its way into their souls. “So become one, my future child, become one."

An audible snap tore across the battlefield, like a high-tension chord finally breaking, and the rebels screamed.

Pink fire erupted within their eyes and burned out through the sockets as tens of thousands clutched their heads, shrieking beneath the impossible need Serafall had planted inside them. Her faithful withdrew in disciplined ranks while the armies of the Old Empire collapsed inward. Spears pierced comrades who had fought shoulder to shoulder moments before, spells ripped through crowded formations, and Devils abandoned their weapons altogether to tear at one another with claws and teeth.

The sky became a slaughterhouse. Bodies split apart amid the blizzard, severed limbs and ropes of entrails tumbling after them as gallons of steaming blood poured over the frozen mountains. White ice disappeared beneath a wet crimson stain while the rebels butchered one another without hesitation, each convinced that only the last survivor would receive Leviathan’s love.

Serafall slowly turned back toward the Orobas triplets, wearing a quiet, knowing grin. But beyond her expression, deep within her eyes, a flare of insanity and ancient evil danced delighted.

She took in the expression of each sister, the flowers in their right eyes trembling while their left eyes widened in utter horror. Oh, but it was cute. The followers of the Old Satans always advocated for the old ways, but the moment the carnage of their dead masters was turned around on them – as was the norm for the previous Crown Princes – they immediately broke down and turned into tearful, sniveling cowards.

Her magic continued to grow, until the weight of her sheer presence began cracking away at their shield. Immediately all three sisters thrust their hands out, reinforcing their barrier and attempting to drive her off. But despite the power boost from the Infinite Ouroboros, they were still so far from the might of a Sin.

Nonetheless, she could see their neutral expression begin to break as the strain of her magic slowly grew too much. Her eyes trailed up their pale arms, watching their veins bulge and creep up their necks. Slowly, her tongue flicked out and swept across her lower lip.

Oh, but she did enjoy this part. The struggle, the resistance. The way they thrashed and glared hatefully, even as hope slowly died in their eyes. She couldn’t wait to grab them by the throats and hold them underwater. To make them scream her name in delectable – ah.

I’m getting carried away. Priorities, priorities, Sera, she thought to herself.

Gradually, she began curling the fingers of her outstretched hand into a fist, and cracks began to appear in their shields.

“Don’t worry,” she said in a sultry voice. “I’m not going to kill you. It’s much more enjoyable to first break you and then put you back together. You’ll thank me by the end of it.”

And in one last flash of pink-tinged darkness, the Orobas sisters were consumed by Leviathan. 

=======

Shemhazai glided toward the apex of the great black tower, his twelve wings held wide against the turbulent air as another tremor passed through the Underworld. The structure swayed beneath him, though the movement was almost imperceptible against its immense proportions. Four narrow spires rose from the cardinal edges of its summit, each etched with defensive scripture and crowned by an iron beacon whose pale flames strained toward the distant violence.

At the center of the platform stood Azazel.

The Governor-General faced the horizon with his wings hidden and his hands folded lightly behind his back. He appeared relaxed from a distance, but Shemhazai knew him well enough to recognize the tension in the straight line of his shoulders and the rigid placement of his fingers. Far beyond the Grigori’s territories, Demonic and Draconic powers continued to collide, sending shockwaves through the fabric of the Underworld and all of its adjacent planes of existence.

Shemhazai touched down behind him and folded his wings, and with casual grace, he walked until he was a few paces behind Azazel.

“All five Satans are currently at war.”

Azazel didn’t answer immediately; his gaze remained fixed upon the horizon while another distant impact rippled through reality, briefly tinting the eastern sky with a sickly mixture of violet and crimson.

“Not all of them,” he finally said. “Ajuka is rather at ease at the moment. Though, knowing him, he won his battle decades ago.”

Shemhazai hummed thoughtfully as he extended his senses toward the overwhelming supernova of a presence that was Beelzebub. He could detect faint movement there, along with several subtle distortions he could not readily identify, but none of the catastrophic violence that was currently surrounding the other four Crown Princes.

“It’s a good thing this Beelzebub wasn’t around in the old days. The Great War may have ended differently had Ajuka been there from the beginning.”

Azazel released a dark chuckle. “A part of me believes there wouldn’t have been a Great War had he lived back then. Ajuka is far too clever for his own good – and just as cruel. I doubt Lucifer and the others would have survived long with him in their shadows.”

“That is not as particularly a reassuring thought as I would have expected.”

“It wasn’t meant to be.” Azazel shifted his weight and glanced over one shoulder. “Ah, well. It’s all nonsensical speculation. I assume our territories are secure?”

Shemhazai nodded, although the motion was followed by an aggrieved sigh. “Yes. Every regional commander has reported in: the outer wards are holding, and none of the resurrected Dragons have wandered close enough to threaten us. Still, it is rather annoying to have long-dead monsters suddenly sprouting throughout the Underworld and rampaging against the Demon Lords. All this shaking is becoming quite cumbersome.”

As if offended by his complaint, the world trembled again. A low groan traveled through the tower as its foundations adjusted, and several of the pale flames atop the surrounding spires bent sharply toward the east.

Shemhazai stepped closer to the platform’s edge and peered through the intervening fabric of space. And as distance peeled away before his gaze, fragments of the conflicts raging throughout the Underworld unfolded before his eyes. He saw frozen countries stained pink beneath Serafall’s presence, vast tracts of wilderness reduced to ruin around Falbium’s stillness, and a distant region where Sirzechs’ Power of Destruction had begun devouring space-time from the horizon. Elsewhere, Ichigo’s fire burned like an open wound against creation… yet Ajuka remained infuriatingly obscure.

Ah well, let the Dark Lords have their play – so long as none of it dared to directly spill over into their lands, they would stay their hands.

That being said, several Cadre were positioned across Grigori territory, reinforcing the dimensional foundations wherever the monstrous swell of Demonic and Draconic power threatened to bleed through. None of the battles had physically reached them, yet merely containing their distant consequences had already required an irritating expenditure of resources.

“Gadreel is none too happy about being deployed again,” Shemhazai remarked.

“Gadreel hasn’t been happy in centuries.”

The bitterness in Azazel’s voice made Shemhazai look toward him sharply. Their sister’s melancholy was borderline infectious, certainly, and her disposition had only worsened as the ages accumulated, but the remark possessed an unkindness that Azazel rarely directed toward their own.

And it was only because Shemhazai knew that Azazel’s tone was only brought about by shared pain and grief that his own anger was kept at bay.

“That wasn’t very nice,” he said with a frown. “Nor was it fair to Gadreel.”

Silence lingered between them for several seconds until Azazel exhaled and lowered his head.

“No,” he admitted. “You’re right. I owe our sister better.”

Shemhazai gingerly stepped beside him and subjected his older brother to an accusing stare. Azazel ignored him for several moments before finally turning enough to meet his gaze.

“You’re in a right foul mood,” he observed. “Is it the Dragons?”

Azazel gave him a dry look. “Not so much the overgrown lizards as the hand behind them.”

Ah. The Infinite Ouroboros.

That explained far more than the Dragons ever could. Nothing ruined an otherwise tolerable day quite like the incomprehensible interference of an eldritch Divine Dragon from the Void. The worst of it was not even the scale of Ophis’ power, although that alone dwarfed everything within Creation. No, what truly rankled them all was the complete absence of any recognizable motive behind its actions. But how did one decipher the mind of a being that had no mind to begin with?

Such was the paradoxical nonexistence of the Infinite Ouroboros. You can’t fight something that’s not even there.

“I have no doubt that the Satans will emerge victorious,” Azazel said with little fanfare.

“I concur, although Sirzechs may have something of a workout ahead of him. Even  a monster like him will have some trouble with that Wyrm.”

Azazel paid him no mind and continued. “But if I can so easily foresee the Satans’ imminent victory, then there is no doubt the Void already has.”

Shemhazai returned his attention to the horizon. For a time, he watched the distant conflicts through his mind’s eye, following the Crown Princes as they confronted the armies of the Old Devil Empire and the ancient Dragons resurrected to oppose them.

“Which begs the question,” he murmured to himself, “what is that Horror after?”

And neither Fallen Lord attempted an answer.

Shemhazai still remembered when the first Devils emerged, slaves and thralls for the original Demons, crafted from Lilith’s flesh in a horrid and fiendish rite. Some small, uncharitable part of him was pleased to watch their descendants invade one another and engage in a senseless civil war that would only serve to weaken them as a whole. But that satisfaction did not last long under the realization that all this was orchestrated by the Infinite Ouroboros.

Shemhazai was old, very old – his life spanned numerous millennia. And he could never recall, not once, a time when Ophis had interfered this blatantly in extant reality.

Oh, to be sure, the Divine Pair were always interfering. It was impossible to escape their omnipresence. But not once, not once, in his memory could he recall an event or anecdote where one of them so liberally used intermediaries to enact their purposes. They were so incomprehensibly powerful that they could simply Will whatever reality they desired, leaving the rest of the multiverse helpless before their whims. Ophis’ recent escapade into Creation simply did not make sense.

But then, that was the Divine Pair in a nutshell: a rhyme without a reason.

“I once spoke to Ophis,” Azazel said suddenly.

Shemhazai was jolted from his thoughts, and he turned toward his brother with an incredulous look.

“You never told me that,” he said with a touch of accusation.

“I never told anyone,” Azazel said quietly. “Not even Father. It was so long ago now, back when the highest towers of the White City still rang with the twin laughter of Michael and Lucifer.”

The soft words carried Shemhazai backward across the ages. For a fleeting moment, he remembered white stones gleaming beneath the radiance of empyreal light: Michael’s warm patience and Lucifer’s impossible beauty before pride and grief transformed their elder brother into a ruinous and heinous thing. But then, those memories belonged to a world that no longer existed; a world none of the eldest Fallen spoke of any longer.

Shemhazai’s brows drew together. “What happened?”

Azazel’s eyes grew distant. “Ere humanity had learned letter or word, I wandered the mortal world, and I encountered an old man drawing his final breaths beneath the shade of sand-hewn stone. He was so decrepit that his skin had folded over itself, like wax long exposed to a flame. He barely even resembled a human.”

“And?”

“And there was something decidedly inhuman that had taken purchase within him.” Azazel’s lips pressed into a thin line. “It was in his eyes… eyes blacker than any abyss I had ever seen, and for one instant, I felt as though all the light and goodness of the world was for naught.”

Shemhazai frowned heavily. “What did Ophis want?”

“To ask me a question.”

“A question?” he repeated in confusion.

Azazel inclined his head and let out a tired sigh. “Is happiness conditioned upon another’s will truly happiness at all?”

Shemhazai blinked in surprise. Of all the things he might have expected from the Infinite Ouroboros, a philosophical query concerning the nature of happiness had not numbered among them. More unsettling still, the question seemed fashioned specifically for their mythos.

“And?” Shemhazai prompted.

“And nothing,” Azazel said plainly. “As soon as the words left his mouth, the old man died and faded into nothing. I returned to the White City and pretended the encounter had never happened, forgetting about it altogether.”

Shemhazai studied his brother’s profile before snorting in disbelief. Pretending to have never met the Infinite Ouroboros and willfully forgetting the encounter? As if. He knew Azazel better than anyone save Michael – his older brother was a notorious liar. The notorious liar. He had always felt that Lucifer’s title as the Prince of Lies was unfounded; Azazel was always the greater deceiver between the two.

“Well, no matter.” Azazel turned away and began walking across the platform. “It is all ancient history. Triple the patrols along the border and lock every gateway. No one gets in or out while those Dragons continue their frenzy.”

Shemhazai watched his retreating back, and suddenly an errant thought occurred to him.

“Is that why you Fell?” Shemhazai asked. “Did you try to find your own happiness beyond Father?”

Azazel faltered for half a step, but he quickly threw back his head and released a boisterous laugh. “Who knows? I’m so old that I’ve forgotten all that dusty history. All I remember is the sweet, first taste of a beautiful woman and how good it felt! Hah!”

Black wings unfurled from his back as he reached the edge of the tower, and with one powerful beat he launched himself into the air. Shemhazai watched him disappear into the darkened sky, his laughter lingering behind him even after distance should have swallowed it.

He slowly shook his head.

“And yet you never forget your lies.”

=======

Rias sat at the center of the hotel suite with her hands folded tightly in her lap, surrounded by every member of her peerage as they watched the television in uneasy silence. No one had spoken for several minutes. Even Issei had abandoned his usual commentary, his attention fixed upon the images of military airships flying across frontier skies while families hurried aboard with whatever possessions they could carry.

The woman presenting the broadcast maintained an admirable composure, although the strain around her eyes betrayed the gravity of the reports arriving through the Ministry of Propaganda.

“Evacuation orders continue to be issued for all those living on the frontier, as the invasion by insurgent forces shows no sign of abating. Citizens are encouraged to take only what is necessary while military convoys assist in relocating them to secure territories.”

Footage shifted behind her, revealing columns of Imperial soldiers fortifying transportation hubs while frightened civilians crowded through guarded portals. Rias watched a mother clutch two young children against her skirts as soldiers ushered them forward, and her fingers tightened until her nails pressed into her palms.

“There hasn’t been a full-scale invasion like this since the first Civil War,” Kiba murmured.

Rias nodded without taking her eyes from the screen. The comparison had been hovering over everyone since the first alarms rang throughout New Lilith, but hearing Yuuto give it voice made the threat feel more immediate. The Old Satan Faction had committed acts of terrorism before, yet this was something altogether different: coordinated armies, attacks across several territories, and outright invasions like those out of her history lessons.

She turned toward the suite’s broad windows. The violet sky normally hanging over New Lilith had darkened to near black, its distant horizons discolored by intermittent flashes of red, green, and pale blue. Enormous waves of Demonic energy saturated the Underworld, pressing against Rias’ senses from every direction as the Satans and numerous Ultimate-class Devils unleashed powers ordinarily restrained for the safety of everyone around them.

The Youth Rating Game Tournament had officially been suspended within the early hours of the morning as the first sirens had rung through the city. In fairness, virtually everything had been suspended. Businesses were shuttered, public transportation had been redirected toward emergency use, and nearly every family in New Lilith had gathered behind whatever protections their homes could offer. Across the Empire, millions were likely doing the same thing—huddling together, listening to the alarms, and praying to the Satans for safety and security.

Suddenly, the vase on the glass table next to her thrummed with a deep and audible vibration. Rias barely had time to lift her head before the entire city lurched.

The suite pitched violently around them as though the ground beneath New Lilith had been upended by some giant hand. Rias was thrown from the sofa and hit the carpet on one shoulder, while furniture overturned and several startled cries erupted behind her. Glasses shattered against the floor, framed paintings tore loose from the walls, and the enormous flat-screen television swayed dangerously upon its stand.

Rias planted one palm beneath herself and pushed upright, her hair falling across her face as another rolling tremor passed through the hotel. Before she could call out to her peerage, a harsh pink light poured through the windows and painted the entire suite in unnatural color.

Beyond the glass, the blackened sky had become a sea of harsh pink lightning that erupted in all directions.

And something dark touched her soul.

She froze in place, one knee still against the carpet. The insidious sensation was subtle at first, little more than a creeping pressure beneath her thoughts, but it deepened with every heartbeat until her Devil instincts screamed at her to prostrate in submission. She was starkly reminded of standing before Lord Ichigo when he allowed an atom’s worth of his power to emerge; that dreadful certainty that she was in the presence of an absolute monster that would tolerate no defiance or challenge.

Yet this was different. The Lord Wrath’s presence provoked submission through terror and the promise of violence, while this power beckoned with dark whispers. It invited Rias to surrender, to fall down and lay bare her body and soul in utter submission. To give in, to give up, and smile as if it were the most sublime thing she could ever do.

Rias’ eyes widened in recognition, because beneath the seductive shadow, she knew that voice.

She dragged herself to her feet and stumbled toward the window, transfixed by the pink radiance flowing across the Underworld’s sky.

“Lord Serafall,” she whispered.

As if the Demon Lord herself had heard her name, another massive quake struck New Lilith in answer to Rias’ soft declaration. The television precariously tipped forward, prompting Kiba and Xenovia to race across the suite and catch it before the screen could crash down upon Asia and Issei.

“What?” Issei exclaimed as he wrapped one arm around Asia and pulled her clear. “Kaichou’s shortstack, big-boobed sister is doing all this? No way!”

Kiba gave him an exasperated look as he and Xenovia forced the television back onto its stand. “You do understand that she is one of the Crown Princes of Hell, right? A fully-fledged Demon Lord who could wipe out entire countries with a literal blink of an eye?”

Asia clung fretfully to Issei’s arm and looked toward the windows. “She always seemed so nice on television.”

Akeno released a quiet sigh as she stepped over the overturned table and its broken glass. “Asia, sweetie, you can’t believe everything you see on TV. Yes, Lord Serafall is relatively nice and welcoming, but she is still a Demon.”

“She’s also a good actor,” Xenovia pointed out, bracing one hand against the television until she was certain it would remain upright.

“Very good,” Akeno agreed with an enthusiastic nod. “I loved her performance in Passion of the Sin.”

“No spoilers,” Koneko said softly.

Akeno blinked and turned toward her. “You haven’t seen it yet?”

Koneko shook her head.

“We’ll rent it when the tournament is over. It’s phenomenal.”

The hotel convulsed again, forcing everyone to seize the nearest stable object. Rias caught the back of the sofa while Gasper latched onto her waist with a frightened squeak.

“Provided we survive this,” Rias said dryly.

“Don’t worry, Buchou!” Issei planted his feet and raised one fist with renewed determination. “I’ll protect you!”

Despite everything, his assertion brought an appreciative smile to her face. But before Rias could respond, Kiba gestured toward the television, where the broadcast had transitioned to carefully selected footage released by the Ministry of Propaganda. Five regions of the Underworld were highlighted across a strategic map, each surrounded by warnings against civilian approach.

“All five Satans have personally deployed to meet the forces of the Old Satan rebels,” Kiba noted sardonically. “Do you really want to fight something that could get past them?”

Issei scratched the back of his head, his enthusiasm wilting beneath the question. “I mean, I don’t want to, but if I have to protect Buchou, then heck yeah!”

Warmth stirred in Rias’ chest. Issei’s courage was frequently tangled with recklessness and blockheadedness, but her Pawn really did have a heart of gold. Even if said gold was stained with criminal levels of perverseness.

“I appreciate the sentiment, Issei, but Yuuto is right. If, by some miracle, the enemy manages to get past the Satans, then our priority will be to run and reach safety. We can always live to fight another day.” She sharpened her gaze until he lowered his hand. “And I mean it. No heroics.”

That being said, she highly doubted that anyone could get past all five Satans and their peerages. She would never forget her older brother and Lord Ichigo casually tearing apart an entire planet in what they had called a light spar.

She still had nightmares about that afternoon.

Issei gave her a quick thumbs-up. “Yup! I totally understand! But I really hope it doesn’t come to that. Dystopian, post-apocalyptic survival isn’t my favorite type of genre.”

Thunder boomed with enough force to rattle the windows in their frames. Pink lightning forked across the sky, illuminating New Lilith in a brilliant flash before the temperature inside the suite suddenly plunged.

Rias gasped as her breath emerged in a pale cloud. Frost spread rapidly across the windows and climbed over the walls in branching crystalline patterns, while an unnatural cold settled into her bones. Lord Serafall’s power had grown stronger, its distant presence transforming the atmosphere without any apparent regard for the hundreds of barriers lying between her battlefield and the capital.

“S-s-so cold!” Gasper stammered through chattering teeth.

Rias turned and drew him into her arms, rubbing both hands along his back as he curled against her. The gesture did little to warm either of them, but Gasper clung to her more tightly and buried his face against her abdomen.

Rias looked toward Akeno, who understood immediately. Her Queen raised both hands and wove a warming spell across the suite, surrounding the peerage in a haze of gentle heat that fought back the encroaching frost.

“This is some powerful ice magic,” Xenovia observed as she examined the frozen windows.

“Lord Serafall is legendary for her elemental prowess,” Kiba said. “They say she can force entire worlds into ice ages with little to no effort.”

“Why is she trying to freeze us?” Issei demanded, still shivering despite Akeno’s spell.

“She isn’t.”

The unfamiliar voice came from behind them.

Everyone whirled toward the suite’s entrance. Sacred Gears manifested and weapons were drawn almost as one, but Rias’ alarm gave way to astonishment when she found Meril standing within the open doorway. The woman appeared entirely composed despite the shaking hotel, her posture straight and her hands resting calmly before her.

“Apologies for the rude entry, Lady Rias, but the need for alacrity outweighs etiquette for the moment.”

“Miss Meril?” Rias looked around at her peerage and felt a flicker of pride beneath her confusion. Every one of them had reacted immediately, placing themselves between her and a possible intruder without awaiting an order. “What’s going on?”

“Direct orders from Lord Ichigo,” Meril answered sharply. “He no longer deems it safe for you and Lady Sona to remain in New Lilith. You will both be moved to the Gremory territory, where Lady Tiamat is presently watching over Young Master Millicas.”

“Ah, I see.” Rias allowed some of the tension to leave her shoulders, although unease continued twisting beneath her ribs. It had been months since she had last returned home, and under any other circumstances the prospect would have delighted her. Now she could only wonder what had changed enough for Ichigo to decide that the Imperial capital was no longer sufficiently secure.

Were she and Sona being targeted because of their siblings? Had the invaders breached a defensive line?

Her face must have given away her thoughts because Meril gave her a rare smile.

“It is purely a precautionary measure,” she assured her. “You are safe, but Lord Ichigo commands that you be even safer. Please, let us not waste time. We must retrieve Lady Sona before I can teleport you all away.”

Rias inclined her head and immediately began directing her peerage toward the door. They filed into the corridor behind Meril, stepping carefully around fallen decorations and overturned furniture as the hotel continued to shudder. Ice had spread and coated the walls, carpets, and ceiling in a thin layer of creeping white.

“Um,” Issei began as they hurried through the trembling hall, “what did you mean when you said she isn’t trying to freeze us? Because I would like to argue otherwise!”

Meril glanced over her shoulder without slowing her pace.

“The Lord Lust is several continents away from New Lilith, and there are hundreds of magical and dimensional barriers standing between her and this city. What you are experiencing is merely the byproduct of a Demon Lord exercising its power.” Her expression remained perfectly neutral as another distant quake passed beneath their feet. “If she wanted you frozen, we would not be having this conversation.”

Silence followed her words as the peerage continued down the frost-covered corridor. And Issei nervously voiced their shared thought.

“Fuck, that’s terrifying.”

=======

The pink-tinged darkness collapsed around the Orobas sisters, swallowing the final traces of their magic before contracting into a single point and disappearing between Serafall’s curling fingers. She spared the place they had occupied one satisfied glance, then turned toward the thunder rolling across the horizon.

She watched as Behemoth hurled his Dragon foe through a mountain range, and Lindwyrm Regis struck the first peak with his spine and continued through the others, breaking stone against his scales until the entire range collapsed behind him. But as the Dragon ripped its way through tons of rubble, she could feel its Will pervade through reality. Like all Greater Dragons, Lindwyrm Regis was born from a powerful concept. And from what she recalled, this Dragon was born from the platonic ideals of Dissolution and Acid.

And the King of Lindwyrms imposed himself upon the wounded land, forcing the bonds within matter to sunder and break. Mountains slumped into streams of separated minerals, iron deposits poured red from their interiors, and entire glaciers divided into water and drifting clouds of salt. Everything dissolved before the Dragon’s dread gaze.

Nonetheless, Behemoth charged across the dissolving country, his deep-purple and black body driving through the slurry while the dense white fur along his spine streamed behind him. Lindwyrm Regis regained his footing and expelled a luminous torrent of acid that engulfed Behemoth from his forward-curving horns to the tip of his tail. But the defensive prowess of Serafall’s two Rooks blazed within the Magical King, hardening muscle and leathery hide until the acid broke around him like surf against a cliff.

Everything beyond Behemoth fared considerably worse, however. The flood carved through the region, turning the ruined mountain range into a great lake of roiling and corrosive acid. Her Rook roared and jumped through the air, one hand clawed back and he brought it down like a furious hammer. The wyrm quickly slithered its long body, but the shockwave from Behemoth’s stroke pushed it back.

Regardless, Lindwyrm Regis answered with another Dragon’s breath, but this time the beam was much narrower and concentrated, and Serafall watched with furrowed brows as Behemoth was pushed back and the patches of hide upon his chest began to darken from the Dragon’s corrosion.

Serafall teleported beneath the Dragon’s jaw before that blemish could deepen and drove one small fist upward. His mouth slammed shut, his skull snapped toward the heavens, and several colossal scales tore loose before she pivoted in the sky and kicked him through the remains of the liquefying mountains.

And the Sin of Lust answered the fell wyrm’s Will, across numerous metaphysical planes of existence her Demonic corruption spilled through reality and imposed its own odious ruin in opposition to the Dragon.

Lust and Dissolution waged wars through unseen realms, battling for supremacy over localized Time and Space. And the two compulsions tore through the liquified region until it divided against itself: half of it renewed its assault upon Behemoth, while the remainder rose from his body in luminous ribbons and curled adoringly around Serafall’s arms.

At the same time, Lindwyrm Regis emerged with a roar from the broken earth as the damage Serafall had inflicted began to heal. Dragons were renowned for their vitality, and one as powerful as this beast who boldly claimed Kingship over all lindwyrms was no different.

But as she gathered her magic for a renewed assault, a shriek from above drew Serafall’s attention toward Ziz as the Magical King of the Sky plummeted through the clouds with Níðhǫggr clinging to his breast.

The black Dragon’s claws had seized a bundle of metallic feathers, tearing and ripping, trying to make its way to the vulnerable flesh beneath. And the legendary dragon opened its maw and unleashed a torrent of ghostfire, the flames of the dead that burned in its belly from the countless corpses it had consumed amidst the darken roots of Yggdrasil. The grey flames blasted against her Pawn, dulling the sheen of his feathers and sapping his very lifeforce.

However, Ziz twisted all the air and made for himself an armor of hurricane force winds, pushing the Dragon and his foul breath away. With a second flicker of his wings, Ziz compressed the air, all the winds gathering from the cardinal directions in one tight sphere, before exploding outward and blasting Níðhǫggr miles away.

Serafall raised both hands toward the distant Dragon, aligning her fingers as she closed one eye to take aim.

And with a satisfied smirk, she said, “Bang.”

Pink Demonic power erupted from her fingertip and engulfed Níðhǫggr within an explosion several miles across. Its lower edge devoured the earth, erasing mountains beneath a widening hemisphere of light. Yet, seconds later, Níðhǫggr emerged wreathed in grey ghostfire. Death and Carrion pressed against Lust as the Dragon imposed his Will, draining the world’s life essence into his wounds until torn flesh knitted and shattered scales regrew whole.

Sera let out a quiet sigh; these two Dragons were beyond annoying. And the worst part was, she couldn’t even go all out! She had to consciously hold back her power from destroying her own Empire. What was it that Berry-head had once said when he invaded Malebolge?

Being too strong for your own good is a thing?

“Not how I wanted to spend my week,” she grumbled to herself.

Across the horizon, Lindwyrm Regis suddenly snapped his head toward her. The wounds along his jaw had already closed, leaving only a few irregular scales to mark where she had struck him, and green radiance began gathering deep within his throat. Níðhǫggr answered from above with a low, rasping growl as ghostfire leaked between his fangs. Serafall felt both Wills shift away from her beasts and settle upon her instead.

Oh, good. They had finally decided to work together to take out the bigger threat.

Lindwyrm Regis released a concentrated beam of acidic energy while Níðhǫggr poured down a widening flood of ghostfire, trapping Serafall between caustic brilliance and the grey flames of the dead. She crossed her arms before her face and allowed Lust to spill outward. Her Demonic corruption thickened around her body, staining both attacks as they collided against her and fought to impose their purpose upon the space she occupied.

Dissolution attempted to pull her apart and Decay demanded that she wither into carrion. But Lust danced between them, convincing the two powers to give in to her, to obey her and even aid her.

The three Wills struggled for only an instant before the collision detonated. Serafall disappeared inside a sphere of combined energy that expanded through the sky and pressed down upon the land, flattening the earth for hundreds of miles. Behemoth dug his claws into the ground and lowered his head against the blast, while Ziz wrapped himself in layers of compressed wind and rode the shockwave into the upper atmosphere.

Serafall emerged from the far side with smoke curling from her clothes and several black veins fading beneath her cheek. She patted out a stubborn grey flame clinging to her shoulder, then looked down at the torn sleeve of her dress with an offended pout.

“That was new, you stinking lizard!”

Níðhǫggr lunged before she could retaliate, his jaws spreading wide enough to swallow her together with the surrounding sky. Ziz struck him from the side, driving both talons into his ribs and carrying him across the heavens. The Dragon twisted around in flight and dragged his claws through Ziz’s legs, peeling away a storm of metallic feathers, but Ziz maintained his grip and drove Níðhǫggr down into Lindwyrm Regis.

The two Dragons crashed together and fell through the country below. Their bodies gouged a trench across the continent, uprooting entire mountain ranges and throwing sheets of molten stone into the air. Behemoth charged after them, leapt into the trench, and brought both fists down upon the tangled wyrms before they could separate.

The impact drove all three through the crust of the Underworld and Serafall swiftly followed as the ground collapsed beneath them.

Beneath her, Lindwyrm Regis coiled around Behemoth’s torso and tightened until the Magical King’s muscles bulged against the pressure. Acid poured between the Dragon’s scales and pooled against Behemoth’s hide, but the power of Serafall’s Rooks continued to hold. His flesh darkened beneath the sustained corrosion without splitting, and Behemoth answered by hooking both hands beneath the wyrm’s body and tearing him away through brute force.

Níðhǫggr then climbed over Behemoth’s back and buried his teeth in the thick white fur at the base of his neck. Ghostfire flooded the bite as the Dragon attempted to rot through his defenses, but Ziz dropped into the chasm behind him and seized Níðhǫggr by the tail. With one violent beat of his wings, the Magical King of the Sky ripped him free and swung him against the wall.

Serafall extended her hand as the Dragon rebounded and Ice formed around Níðhǫggr’s limbs before quickly expanding until his body was sealed inside a crystalline mass several miles across. She clenched her fingers and compressed it all at once. Scales cracked beneath the pressure, bones splintered, and draconic blood filled the ice in branching veins.

The Dragon’s Will pressed back against hers, and everything living in the surrounding layers died. Buried roots shriveled inside the earth, colonies of infernal insects fell still within their tunnels, and the remaining life essence rushed into Níðhǫggr. His wounds closed around broken bones, new scales pushed out through the old, and the ice surrounding him dulled as he devoured the magic sustaining it.

“This is so annoying!” Serafall began to seethe.

She turned her wrist, allowing Lust to slide into the vitality flowing toward him. The streams of pale energy flushed pink and curved away from Níðhǫggr’s wounds, circling Serafall instead with slavish obedience. She smiled at the Dragon’s abrupt snarl and drew the stolen life around one finger before flicking it toward Ziz. The stolen vitality spread across her Pawn’s damaged flesh, restoring his form beneath his torn metallic plumage.

Lindwyrm Regis chose that moment to drive Behemoth through the opposite wall. His power spread far ahead of them, dissolving miles of stone before their bodies arrived and transforming the deep earth into a churning sea of boiling earth. Behemoth sank into the unstable mass, and the Dragon coiled around him once more, forcing his long body beneath the Magical King’s arms before tightening around his throat.

Serafall teleported between them and blasted the dragon’s head with a powerful burst of Demonic energy. She then caught his upper snout in both hands, pushed herself upright, and hauled backward until the Dragon’s head followed. Behemoth thrust his arms beneath the loosened coils and tore them apart, allowing Serafall to fling Lindwyrm Regis over her shoulder.

But at that moment, she felt something give. And an alien sensation traveled through her thoughts, followed by a wave of exhaustion that did not belong to her.

‘Sorry, mistress,’ an exhausted voice echoed through her mind. ‘I’ve failed you…’

Serafall’s mouth set grimly as she realized that Kosara’s barriers had finally fallen – even restrained, her Sin was too much for her Bishop to handle, never mind the two rampaging Dragons that absolutely were not holding back.

A fresh bout of worry flooded through Serafall’s mind. Because now there was nothing to contain their combined power from spilling into the rest of the Underworld and cascading over the Empire.

Fuck!

But just as Serafall’s worry began to sharpen into something dangerously close to panic, two powerful signatures entered the region.

From the corner of her eye, she saw an armored Devil appear above Lindwyrm Regis with an enormous greatsword raised over one shoulder. Jaqrin dropped upon the wyrm and drove the blade deep into the side of his neck, using his weight to force the Dragon against the chasm wall. And while the weapon barely penetrated the ancient scales, it held Lindwyrm Regis still long enough for Behemoth to rear back with a roar and punch him across the jaw.

The Dragon tore free from Jaqrin’s sword and disappeared through miles of bedrock beneath an avalanche of molten stone. At the same time, a massive skeletal Dragon crashed into Níðhǫggr from the opposite direction and closed its jaws around his throat. Ghostfire streamed into the undead construct’s mouth as it began devouring the grey flames surrounding him, stripping away his defenses until Ziz could drive both talons into the flesh beneath. Great sheets of draconic blood splashed across the cavern floor, and then Cornelia appeared above them and summoned a pair of skeletal arms large enough to seize Níðhǫggr’s wings. They wrenched them apart before flinging the Dragon into the ground.

Serafall blinked in surprise. “Jaqrin? Cornelia? What are you two doing here?”

“Apologies for the intrusion, my Prince,” Jaqrin called as he pulled his greatsword free from the stone. “Lord Falbium sent us to reinforce you.”

“Shouldn’t you be helping Falbi instead?” Serafall asked with a curious tilt of her head. Nonetheless, she continued attacking, summoning a hail of enormous ice spears and sending them down upon both Dragons. Most shattered against their scales, but several found the wounds opened by Ziz and Behemoth and sank deeply enough to draw blood.

“Jaqrin and I killed Creuserey Asmodeus, and Lord Falbium has already sealed the two Dragons sent against him,” Cornelia answered, unable to keep a touch of pride from entering her voice.

“What!?” Serafall’s head snapped toward the vampire. “Falbi was the first one to finish his battle? Not Ajuka?”

But Níðhǫggr interrupted with a tremendous roar as ghostfire exploded from his body. The expanding flames annihilated Cornelia’s skeletal Dragon and forced Ziz away before they could rot through his metallic plumage. Serafall quickly swept one hand toward her Pawn and doused the grey fire beneath a wash of pink ice, but Níðhǫggr had already opened his jaws again.

A concentrated beam of necrotic energy tore toward them. Serafall reached into it with Lust and forced its hunger to submit to her, bending the attack away from herself even as she called out a warning. Jaqrin teleported clear while Behemoth lunged aside, and Níðhǫggr’s breath streaked across the miles separating him from Lindwyrm Regis.

However, the other Dragon had recovered from Behemoth’s punch. Green radiance blazed inside his throat, and Lindwyrm Regis answered with a concentrated beam of his own.

Serafall’s eyes widened as she realized the two breaths were heading right for one another. And that was a lot of draconic power.

With a twist of her magic, she gathered Behemoth and Ziz together with Jaqrin and Cornelia, then teleported them high above the surface an instant before the opposing energies met.

Far high in the sky, she watched as the entire ground glowed molten red. And then it erupted, splitting the continent as burning stone was thrown into the upper atmosphere. Ghostfire and acidic brilliance burst through the surface together, transforming hundreds of square miles into a blasted, burning ruin.

“That’s going to ruin quite a few people’s weekend,” Cornelia quietly muttered as she watched the eruption spread. “But yes, Lord Falbium is remarkably capable. He quickly came up with a plan to deal with his Dragons.”

Níðhǫggr and Lindwyrm Regis then erupted from the molten surface with titanic roars, magma dripping harmlessly from their scales as they seemed no worse for wear. Whatever injuries they had suffered were already closing and healing.

Damn Dragons and their near-endless vitality!

“I am getting so tired of these damn things!” Serafall shouted. But then she turned a disgruntled look upon Cornelia and narrowed her eyes. “Also, what’s that supposed to mean? Are you trying to say I’m not capable?”

Cornelia stared at her, visibly caught off guard, but Jaqrin intervened before she could answer. “You’ll have to forgive her, my Prince. She’s been riding rather high ever since she finally confessed to Lord Falbium.”

“J-Jaqrin!” Cornelia exclaimed, a light blush forming on her pale cheeks.

Serafall’s head snapped back in her direction. “You what!?”

“I-I, well, you see—”

And with that, Serafall released a high-pitched squeal, teleported to Cornelia’s side, and caught both of her hands. She smiled up at the ancient vampire with such delighted intensity that Cornelia instinctively leaned away.

“Girl! Tell! Me! Everything!”

Cornelia managed a faint smile, although the distress upon her beautiful features was unmistakable. “N-now is hardly the time, my Lord Lust.”

As if agreeing with her, both draconic auras flared hugely, rising well beyond the confines of a normal Satan-class.

“Ah, crap,” Serafall muttered as she saw both dragons gather orbs of energy larger than their own bodies in front of their maws, Time and Space twisting and warping around their gathered energy.

“That’s… enough power to destroy a good chunk of the Underworld…” Jaqrin said tentatively, his eyes wide with fright.

“Gah! I’m getting so angry!” Serafall grouched. “It’s no fair that they can throw out all these big attacks, but I have to play defensive and hold myself back!”

With a long-suffering sigh, Serafall teleported her peerage members, along with Falbium’s two away. And in that same instant, both Dragons unleashed the full scope of their breath, and the entire western horizon was consumed by dragonfire.

Serafall touched her Sin, sending it out into the fabric of space, and reality itself bent around her. The very idea, the very concept of ‘Where’ became a slave to her Will, and as the dragons’ dual attack came near her, they curved around her form, unable to touch her. She then bent the colossal world-ending energy and sent it skyward, far beyond the reach of the Underworld’s atmosphere.

And in the next second, the draconic energy detonated with such force that the entire sky turned a bright white, the violet skies turned to the brightest of day for several long moments.

Serafall then teleported to where her peerage and Jaqrin and Cornelia were.

“They may fall into an Outrage at this rate,” Jaqrin warned grimly.

“I’m going to fall into an outrage at this rate!” Serafall loudly exclaimed. “Wait, where is Falbi? Why isn’t that lazybones here helping me?”

“We’re not entirely certain,” Jaqrin admitted as he raised his greatsword against the approaching Dragons. “But he did give us some advice.”

“Well, out with it!” Serafall gritted over the sound of draconic roars as Behemoth and Ziz surged forward to meet Níðhǫggr and Lindwyrm Regis.

“With Kosara’s assistance, I can open a rift into the Dimensional Gap,” Cornelia explained. “Once we force the Dragons into hyperspace, Your Highness can unleash her full power without destroying the Underworld.”

Serafall immediately brightened. “That’s perfect! I’ll keep them occupied.”

And then she reached through the fabric of space and pulled Kosara into the sky beside them. The blonde Rusalka sagged visibly, her face pale with exhaustion, so Serafall caught her by the shoulders and offered her Bishop a sympathetic smile.

“You did a wonderful job, sweetie, but I need one last thing from you. Cornelia will explain.”

Kosara nodded tiredly, and Serafall gave her an encouraging squeeze before turning toward the approaching Dragons. Pink magic gathered around her body as she vanished, reappearing between the two wyrms with both hands already raised to attack.

Serafall reappeared between the Dragons and threw both hands outward.

Chains of ice erupted from the air around her. Each link was large enough to encircle a mountain, and they wrapped around Níðhǫggr’s throat, wings, and limbs before twisting around Lindwyrm Regis in the opposite direction. Both Dragons roared and strained against their restraints, but Serafall layered another spell over the first. Gravity intensified around them until the sky buckled beneath the pressure, crushing both wyrms against the ground.

She might not have been a monstrous prodigy on the level of Sirzechs or Ajuka, but Serafall was no slouch when it came to sorcery. And she was damn good at it.

Lindwyrm Regis struck the ground first, followed by Níðhǫggr a moment later. The continent sank beneath their combined weight as Serafall tightened the chains and increased the gravity crushing them from above. Behemoth descended upon Lindwyrm Regis with a roar and hammered both fists into his skull, while Ziz landed upon Níðhǫggr’s back and drove his talons repeatedly through the scales along his spine.

The Dragons thrashed beneath the assault. Acid ate through entire lengths of Serafall’s chains while ghostfire aged others into brittle fragments, but every broken restraint was replaced by three more. Serafall kept her attention divided between the two, reinforcing her spells while denying them enough freedom to turn their attacks upon Cornelia and Kosara.

Then she felt the fabric of the Underworld split behind her.

Cornelia and Kosara hovered together above a vast magical array, their hands linked as their powers flowed into its turning rings. Jaqrin stood before them with his greatsword raised, guarding both women while the opening widened from a narrow black wound into a gargantuan rift. The violent colors of the Dimensional Gap churned beyond it, stretching farther than Serafall could see.

Her lips curled into a vicious smile.

“Finally,” she said to herself in triumph.

She released the gravity holding the Dragons down and replaced it with a telekinetic wave powerful enough to tear the surrounding mountains from their foundations. Níðhǫggr and Lindwyrm Regis were ripped from the ground and hurled toward the breach. Lindwyrm Regis went clean through the breach, but Níðhǫggr managed to get a claw and a wing on the metaphysical tear. However, Behemoth leaped forward and slammed his fist into the Death Dragon’s face, sending it flying deep into the Dimensional Gap.

Serafall stopped at the edge, glanced toward her Pieces and gave them a playful wink. “Ziz, Behemoth, stay behind. Mommy is gonna go all out.”

And before either beast could protest, she flew into the Dimensional Gap and deftly sealed the breach closed behind her, ensuring the Underworld remained far away.

At last, Serafall allowed the powers of the Demon Lord Leviathan to come out in full, she no longer had to hold back in fear of harming her own children.

Her power exploded outward with enough force to shake the hyperspace between dimensions. The multicolored walls of distant realities trembled around her as pink Demonic energy flooded the Gap, and both Dragons were swept away before they could recover.

With a savage laugh, Leviathan overtook Lindwyrm Regis and drove her fist through the scales beneath his ribs. The impact folded his body around her arm before launching him into Níðhǫggr. She followed with a barrage of Demonic blasts, each detonation tearing holes through the boundaries of nearby worlds and spilling her corruption into whatever lay beyond them.

And she completely did away with her favored ice magic.

She struck with raw power instead, battering the Dragons apart with her fists before blasting them back together with waves of pure and furious magic. Níðhǫggr’s jaw shattered beneath her heel while Lindwyrm Regis’ ribs were crushed with a swipe of her hand. And although their flesh tried to repair itself, Serafall’s miasma had already infected every wound. New scales emerged discolored and soft before sloughing away, while the torn flesh beneath continued to blacken and rot.

Both Dragons recoiled from her and released deafening roars that shook hyperspace. Their auras climbed higher, swelling with every breath, and their eyes burned feral red.

She watched them double in size as a violent crimson haze rose from their scales. Their auras exploded through the Dimensional Gap like endless magical furnaces, releasing furious waves of draconic power that crashed against her own and forced it steadily backward. And even though there power crept past even hers, still their strength continued to rise. What had begun as oceans of power expanded beyond any reasonable measure, growing denser and hotter with every passing instant until each Dragon burned before her like an entire star. The pressure of their combined berserk state finally overwhelmed her presence altogether, smothering her Demonic energy beneath an eruption of power several times greater than her own.

She lifted her chin and looked on in equal parts appreciation and curiosity. This was the first time she had ever stood against a Dragon that had unleashed its Outrage, much less two.

And yet…

Leviathan merely placed one finger against her lips and smiled coldly.

“But it’s too late,” she said pityingly. “I’ve already won. I won the moment you were no longer in the Underworld.”

Both dragons had spent the entire battle being exposed to her Sin, and now she could afford to unleash it in full. Her soul folded outward - the Darkness of Lust wholly erupted.

Leviathan’s body dissolved into ethereal pink light, her familiar shape stretching into a towering feminine silhouette with soft wisp-like wings, a pair of horns curved upward from over her brow, and a crown of black fire erupted above her – denoting that this was indeed a Crown Prince of Hell.

Her face vanished, leaving only a smooth and featureless radiance. And around the Demon Lord opened an abyss so completely black that even the shifting colors of the Dimensional Gap disappeared within it. And though the darkness occupied only the space surrounding her, it folded in on itself endlessly, perpetuating an infinite abyss.

A black desire that could never be fulfilled - only ever want more.

“Behold,” said the Crown Prince. “Luxuria Vorago.”

Níðhǫggr and Lindwyrm Regis roared in answer, their rage having consumed their mind and reason, and they unleashed their breaths together. World-ending torrents of ghostfire and acidic energy shattered the Gap, each dozens of miles wide and magnified severalfold by their Outrage.

But Lust merely raised one hand.

Instantly, both attacks curved toward her open palm. Their immense energies narrowed as they approached, compressing until the two apocalyptic beams collapsed into a single orb floating daintily above her fingers.

“I told you.” And the Demon Lord laughed, causing shadows to fall across the worlds exposed through the surrounding dimensional tears. “It’s too late. You can no longer harm me. Your very power desires me. It wants to please me. To obey me.”

Leviathan then raised her other hand, and both Dragons spasmed as their power tore free from their souls. Vast streams of draconic energy poured out of their mouths, wounds, and scales before rushing into the abyss surrounding Lust. All their strength has ceased obeying them; abandoning them outright in the slavish desire to please the Sin of Lust. Their bodies began to shrink rapidly as their vitality ebbed out; even the crimson haze of Outrage weakened until it vanished from their eyes.

Níðhǫggr and Lindwyrm Regis thrashed in place, but the Demon Lord’s magic held their weakening bodies in place. Eventually, even that desperate desire to struggle became a desire to please her.

And Lust made them hers.

The stolen energy gathered above Leviathan’s hands, expanding into an enormous pink sphere hundreds of miles across. Decay and Dissolution churned inside it alongside Leviathan’s own Demonic power; all three forces bound together by the desire to worship and adore her.

Want Me

Desire Me

Love Me

For You, There is Only Me

So Live For Me

And Die For Me

She brought her hands down, and both dragons were consumed in their own power.

=======

Above all of Time, the Soul King exerted his infinite strength; each blow of his mighty blade fell with the power to sunder entire realities. And Amatsu-Mikaboshi – the Dread Star of Heaven – answered in kind.

A single second between them lasted the breadth of eternity, and within that eternity not but a single second passed. Such was the apex of the Deathless – infinity reflected upon infinity. There were no battles of the flesh, no physical forces being exerted – only Immortal Will cutting all the branches of Time to their desired shape.

But that shape had been obscured, the Great Tree of Time occluded beneath the shadow of the Infinite Ouroboros. Though vaguely, he could still see his Son wage his wars in the Underworld – along with the other Hell-grafted horrors. But for one instant, for one flicker through the endless paradox of the Fourth World, he saw through the shadowed boughs of Time.

He saw the Beast of Lust lay low two of the foul drakes resurrected by the Void. And he saw them tumbling through the Gap of Worlds until they fell into the mortal plane, the husk of their bodies burning like comets over the skies of the Earth and dissipating into black motes that scattered through all the fair winds.

And as he clashed against Amatsu-Mikaboshi for the first and last time, he frowned to himself. Because the shadows of the Void-Serpent were smiling.

=======

A/N: Been a while since I've written a chapter wher eIchigo did not appear. But I wanted to give Sera the highlight, to showcase the powers of a Sin. The Dragons may have been stronger than her, but in typical Bleach fashion - she protec, she attac, she out hax. I will say, being my own worst critic - aside from that one Albanian guy on AO3 who wanted me to kill myself - I did get upset at myself when I did a read through and edit of the final draft. I got a little too repetitive with the Kaijuu battle imagery. Too many mountains getting wiped out. I will endeavor to do better in the future. Have a lovely weekend!The Beast of Lust