'I need a favor. Board the Hearse and join this parade to the world designated as Draconic Deus.'
'Because I like you, Nicholas.'
'You stink'
*Crunch*
Under the cloudy purple sky, with no clouds drifting in sight, Nicholas gripped the compass-like device tightly in his hand. Now quite certain he had been scammed by Exlorashif again, he felt a vein throb with burning anger as he looked at the figure before him.
He looked young.
This wasn't a matter of physical appearance, but of essence itself. Now what is essence? A lot of people have a sophisticated explanation, such as origin or the core of the soul, but Nicholas knows the guy who made it. Essentially, it is a method improvised by a certain Contractor (an Outer God's Direct Reincarnator) to reveal the truth beneath falsehoods—after being cat-fished far too many times, then it became a stable detection method between Contractors.
By the look of it, the opposing guy was by no means a veteran; even his trait seemed to be releasing uncontrollably around him, expanding outward. Although Nicholas had never seen a trait that could overlap with the world itself, he had been through too much to judge anything hastily.
{Just another pitiful bastard thrown into this mess? Did he get dragged in by his Contractor(an Outer God) as some sort of hellish trial? From the look of it, he seems cherished by his Contractor. Luckily, he didn't die immediately or I'd be chased once again. Let me teach him a lesson.}
Nicholas shook his head and assumed a fighting stance, then stomped the ground, releasing a blast of air around him.
As the wind blew, Leo, who had been eying the glowing crystals on the armor, unable to understand how a crystallization of life force had managed to hurt him, felt something amiss. It was as if the universe itself were trying to warn him; then his clothes rustled, his eyes widened, and his pupils dilated.
Leo felt his vision blur. Like the crystals before it, something incomprehensible forced itself into his brain, but unlike the vision, it manifested as a sense of smell.
It was vile, as though it had shaped itself into the most horrible thing imaginable. Like desperately needing to use the toilet, only to find that the sole option is a public one that hasn't been flushed in forever. A bio-hazard. Even removing his sense of smell didn't work; the stench forced one into existence solely so he could experience it, leaving him completely unable to respond.
*THUD*
As Leo blinked his blurred eyes open, a hard metallic gauntlet was already making intimate contact with his jaw. Bone shattered with a jarring crack as Nicholas spun halfway around and flung Leo like a missile into the distance, leaving behind a sonic boom.
Watching Leo skip across the solid ground before vanishing behind a hill, Nicholas shook his head and checked the compass given to him by Exlorashif to detect Kathréftis' location. The battery was dead and that only worsened his mood.
Suddenly, he took a quick sidestep as an azure blue overtook everything before him. Like a speeding train, the torrent of energy tore through the air before vanishing into the distance, leaving a terrible scorch etched into the ground.
Taking in the aftermath, Nicholas blinked, then quickly bent backward, his spine arching until his back nearly touched the ground as another torrent of energy, three times larger, whistled right past the front of his nose. As the beam dissipated, he rose slowly, smoke rising from his left eyebrow.
In the absolute silence, he raised two fingers and extinguished the smoldering brow, then looked left to see a mountain reduced to a pool of molten lava.
Running a hand over his bald head, he glanced at the sky. The weather was now sunny, courtesy of the beam—a clear purple sky with clouds drifting lazily.
"…"
After a moment spent contemplating life, Nicholas threw a punch with his other arm, striking so fast it tore open a space portal. As he leapt toward it, a red spear shot out from behind the portal, aiming straight for his eye—only to be blocked by a crystal. Sparks exploded in every direction as the impact knocked him back.
As he tried to evade the spear, a palm smacked into his armored cheek. The force nearly twisted his head off, carrying an irresistible rotational power that slammed Nicholas into the ground. He spun violently, his bald head drilling into the earth as the compass flew free, arcing through the air before landing in the assailant's hand.
Glancing at the compass in his hand, Leo couldn't decipher it at a glance. Using himself as a reference, it seemed to be pointing at him, which only confused him further. He quickly moved it away since there was still that horrible smell clinging to it.
Digging his hands into the ground, Nicholas groaned as several crystals burst from his body, completely nullifying the remaining force. They expanded outward, spreading in all directions like a blanket of dreamlike crystals.
Jumping to his feet, he cracked his neck and glanced at the compass in Leo's hand before rushing forward, growling as a flurry of crystal shards erupted around him. "Bastard, who the hell do you think you are?!"
The answer came as a black mass of matter erupting from Leo's shoulder blades, forming a writhing blob before exploding into several speeding lines aimed straight at his vitals. To Leo's surprise, the angel wings bounced off the crystals and shattered as Nicholas punched forward, a massive greatsword of crystal launching toward him.
Leo simply stepped aside—but a burly figure flashed beside the sword, grabbing the hilt and swiping at the hand holding the compass. However, Nicholas barely had time to react, raising the greatsword as a shield just as Leo's face inflated grotesquely, the edges of his mouth tearing open into a monstrous maw.
A massive energy beam fired at point-blank range.
*BOOM*
The torrent of energy slammed into the crystal greatsword, the impact caving in the ground as smaller beams scattered wildly in every direction. Gritting his teeth as his feet dug deep into the soil, Nicholas screamed and forcefully swung the sword, rebounding the beam straight back into Leo's mouth—only for Leo, to Nicholas's dismay, he casually swallowed it.
Suddenly, the compass shot straight toward Nicholas's face. As he reached to grab it, it transformed into a gleaming red spear aimed directly at his eye.
{AGAIN?!}
Only to be deflected by a rapid crystal formation, but it didn't end there. Leo swept in from below, his wings reshaping into a blade as he slashed toward Nicholas's neck.
*Ding*
The wings vibrated wildly on impact, and Leo felt the full force of the strike reflected back into him, bending his arm at an unnatural angle.
{What a turtle shell… but since it's reflection—huh?}
Feeling the backlash, Leo instantly activated Gold Experience's ability to reflect damage. The moment he did, his entire arm exploded into a cloud of black fog.
"Have a taste of it, bastard!" Amused that someone tried to use a normal-world reflection against his own trait of reflection, Nicholas laughed loudly and swung the sword again—only for the ground beneath him to rupture.
A carpet-like black shadow burst upward, engulfing the terrain as a massive dragon's head tore free, its bloody maw snapping shut around him.
Driving the sword into the dragon's teeth, Nicholas used the momentum to launch himself skyward. The colossal body of the dragon emerged fully from the shadows, one of VI's heads soaring higher as its cheeks bulged before firing upward. But instead of flames, a massive black sludge erupted into the sky, exploding and scattering like rain. As it fell, the world's colors dimmed beneath a curtain of darkness.
"A summon of this scale? Tch… just how much did your Contractor(Outer God) spend, you worthless fuck?" Clad in crystal, Nicholas wiped the black rain from his face, unable to suppress his jealousy.
These snobby, useless contractees always got everything—Outer Gods eager to raise them to terrifying heights—while he was stuck with either a pile of foul divine stench or that bastard Exlorashif.
{Kill him. Smash his skull and take everything he ha—No.}
Eyes bloodshot, Nicholas roared and charged like a cannonball toward Leo, then abruptly smacked his own head, flooding his crystals with energy and forcing himself awake.
{A mental attack? Why can't I block this black rain?!}
Panic surged through him. No matter how thick his defenses, the black sludge dragged out the worst within him. Through the curtain of darkness and rain, he looked up to see the one-armed Leo staring silently, raising what remained of his arm as it regenerated mid-motion.
Resting his thumb on the green orb of his necklace, Leo spun it. Sparks flared, lighting the darkness before the orb flashed.
FLAMES!
As if dawn broke after an endless night, the dim world erupted into blinding fire. The flames rolled outward like a tidal wave, the black sludge igniting as if it were pure fuel. Even the falling droplets burned away, dancing across the sky like fiery sprites.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH—!"
Nicholas stared in disbelief before looking at his hands—nothing but blinding flames devouring everything, including himself. Then the pain hit. All at once. Not heat, not physical damage—his defenses held—but the burning sludge had burrowed into his soul, and as it burned, so did he.
"AHH—Ah—hah—hah… IFRIT, COME TO ME!"
Screaming in agony, Nicholas rolled across the ground before forcing himself upright. A deep-blue, dreamlike crystal formed above him, and without hesitation, he drove it straight into his chest.
A storm of flames erupted from his position, a pillar of fire roaring skyward. From within the inferno, a reptilian, demonic figure with massive horns emerged where Nicholas once stood.
"ROOOOOAAAR—!"
*THUD*
The creature tried to lift its head, but a spinning red spear slammed down from the sky, smashing its skull into the ground and snapping its jaws shut. The beast glared at Leo, its eyes blazing with fury.
With a stomp, flames exploded from the earth as the creature arched its body. Crystals formed across its frame—especially along its claws and horns—as it prepared to charge. Leo tightened his grip on his flame-wreathed spear, already calculating how to crack that absurdly hard shell since space tearing also cannot leave a dent on those crystals.
Then, with an explosive burst of fire, the creature—Ifrit—launched in the opposite direction.
"…"
After a few massive leaps, it vanished from sight, leaving Leo standing in the dust. His expression remained casual, but his spear slipped slightly from his grip before his facade cracked.
Two streaks of light tore across the underworld, earthquakes trailing in their wake.
---
High above the scorched land, four figures tore through the sky, passing the ruins of the earlier battle.
"Ajuka, can you locate them yet?"
"I'm trying—but it's abnormal. The power they're using doesn't belong to this world. One of them is still emitting clear draconic signals, but…" Ajuka hesitated. "You won't like the rest."
"Great Red?"
"No. There are rumors of Poseidon clashing with the Fall to protect the ocean. Exaggerated, yes, but the energy signature matches well."
Silence followed, then Sirzechs Lucifer finally waved his cloak. "Whoever he is, he can't be allowed to tear the Underworld apart. If it comes to a fight, we fight and we aren't alone in this sentiment."
The others nodded as Ajuka Beelzebub said "Understood, let's move"
At his signal, a magic circle flared and four Satans arrived. A split second later, a flaming reptilian blur screamed past them. A massive fireball followed, drowning the world in orange light.
Sirzechs vanished and reappeared ahead of it. Demonic power surged as a massive Sphere of Destruction met the fireball head-on. The sphere shuddered violently, then devoured the flames.
*B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B…* ×N
As the flames cleared, The Satans barely had time to take in the battlefield before a sound like broken beatboxing ripped through the air. A figure glowing with lethal energy blasted past them, chased by two dragon heads vomiting fire.
"Roooaar!"
"Why are you running?!"
"ROAAAAAR!!"
"WHY ARE YOU RUNNING?!"
The sky fractured into chaos—fireballs, red spears, crystal shards, beams of power—everything colliding as the two blinked in and out of space like mismatched meteors.
"... Are they playing tag?" Serafall muttered as dragon heads larger than hills erupted from the ground, scorching everything around them.
"..."
Ajuka didn't answer. He grabbed Serafall and yanked her back just as a molten tail swept through their previous position like a scythe.
"Hmph, why don't you sto—UGH!" Falbium Asmodeus flashed forward, absolute defense blooming around him, but it didn't matter. Defense, Satan, even pride, everything was swept away in one motion as Falbium shoot like a ball punted by a goalkeeper.
"Falbium-chan?!"
The Satans froze for half a heartbeat. However, they still couldn't stop him as Falbium slammed straight into the other combatant radiating pressure like a collapsing star.
"Don't even think abo—HMMMMM!" He pushed his absolute defense to its limit, bracing for impact. But instead, a single hand extended forward. His aura melted like snow under the sun as the hand gently covered his face—then squeezed.
The two spun together in a deadly spiral before Falbium became a screaming projectile once more.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!"
*B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-T* ×N
As the bald Satan spun through the sky, Leo followed close behind, his energy output climbing dangerously. A massive spatial portal formed ahead. Seeing this, Nicholas tried to resume his escape, but a wave of extremely compressed destruction slammed into him as several magic circles locked into place around his body.
Scoffing at what he thought were futile attempts, Nicholas rebounded the destructive force. The moment he tried to move, however, he realized the air around him had turned thick and slimy, resisting every motion.
As Serafall caught Falbium, Ajuka calmly flicked his hand as a teleportation circle swallowed the Satans just as a massive golden hoof punched through space.
Lightning exploded.
The kick sent Nicholas rocketing away like a comet, tearing through clouds as three dragon heads chased him like hunting serpents.
---
Deep within the Dimensional Gap Mansion, Gugalanna, POMD, slept peacefully with a nose bubble rising and falling as his body suddenly sank slightly. In his dream, something brushed his hoof, so he swatted it away.
---
Back in the sky.
Leo finally stopped moving, his feet sank further into the ground with each boosted gear sound.
The pressure doubled and boosted gear whistled like a boiling kettle.
Then doubled again.
"Is that the Boosted Gear? Why is it… expanding?"
"Shouldn't we stop him?!"
"Too late for that, retreat and prepare a barrier!"
The Satans retreated as the energy signals grew even more dangerous.
*B-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-T———* ×N
{Um, Partner?}
"Ye?"
{What are you doing?}
"Boosting."
The Boosted Gear screamed past its limits, sound system blurring into static.
{Yes, the Boosted Gear's durability, and for what?}
"Longinus Smasher."
{Oh, make sense... Wait.}
"Longinus…" Leo pumped mana into the Boosted Gear as if there were no tomorrow. He clenched his fist. The gauntlet cracked as dark blue, highly compressed dark-blue mana venting violently, "... Smasher."
{That's just the attack name—!}
*BOOM!*
Leo transformed into a deep-blue comet, shooting skyward, Ddraig's roar echoing behind him.
Nicholas formed a massive crystal greatsword and managed to cleave one of VI's heads. Then he noticed it—a bright, dangerous blue comet racing toward him, while the remaining two heads fired a mixture of flames and black sludge.
Assessing the situation, he roared. A gigantic crystal mass formed above him, which he hurled at the comet as he leapt straight into the incoming flames.
Through the burning pain, and out of the corner of his eye, he saw the crystal chunk shatter the comet with ease, dispersing it into sparks.
Only then did he realize the flames weren't that hot.
The realization came too late.
The comet burst through the fire and crashed directly into the sword he raised in haste.
At this moment, as their eyes locked, Leo also came to realization... He forgot he still has things to ask.
*Crash*
*Crack*
As the Longinus shattered into debris, Nicholas felt everything fail at once.
His sword snapped.
His body folded.
And the world became... blue.
"Ajuka… that's not real, right?" Serafall stared blankly, her trembling finger pointing forward.
Ajuka said nothing. His fists were clenched white.
A small blue sun bloomed in the Underworld. Not large. Not blinding. Yet no one could ignore it. The sphere of energy pulsed slowly as the space around it began to collapse inward—until the barrier tore open, revealing the Dimensional Gap beyond.
Within the Gap, Great Red advanced toward the source of the disturbance—then paused. A horrific shockwave and torrent of energy tore past him, spanning the Gap itself, tinting his scales blue for a fleeting instant.
He turned away.
Whatever this was, it wasn't his problem.