After taking in the battlefield, I decided on where to start–the battle with my team.
I teleported in front of the loping Ghoul and swung with my fingers shaped like claws, sending out 10 crisscrossing slashes that ripped through flesh, blood, and bone.
Momentum carried the ghoul forward, several steps before its body collapsed. A snap of my finger incinerated the body in a conflagration of Black fire.
The wall to my left exploded as the smoking body of Yelena flipped out. She fired twin webbing, grabbing the asphalt and steadying herself just before Armando exploded out.
He stood nearly eight feet tall, his body a mix of crystal and shifting metal. He had spikes on his joints, and his eyes glowed with a purple light.
The team surged forward, flanking Yelena. Daredevil had combined his vibranium batons into a single, long staff and was heaving, blood pooling from his mouth and staining the Vibranium suit. The others fared the same, all in various stages of injury and rapidly regenerating.
Armando tilted his head at me.
"Dante?" he rumbled out. "Lauren is looking for you."
"I wasn't surprised when I learned about Garret and Lauren, but you…I thought you believed in the cause, and now you attack SHIELD HQ when I was off saving the world?"
"Lauren told us everything," he said. "You don't care about us. You just want Shin off your back?"
"That's probably true," I shrugged. "But what about you? What do you care about?"
"Freedom," he said tentatively. "Power. I've been at the mercy of the demons and the government before. I refuse to be at yours."
"You'll serve a megalomaniac god instead?"
"At least he's honest," he said.
"Shame," I muttered. "I liked you." I raised a hand towards the team. "I'll handle the rest."
"Be careful, he's–" Yelena had barely spoken when I teleported in front of Armando and punched his jaw, fist packed with demonic fire mana. The shockwave put them all on their ass and sent Armando twisting into the atmosphere. I was behind him before he could fully adapt, fingers pulled back in a bow-like fashion. A great bow of Solid Black Fire formed in my hand. I materialized an arrow before quintupling the Density of the construct with a flex of Density Shift and my Affinity.
The heat warped the air, evaporating moisture and burning oxygen. The arrow leapt from my bow the second I released it, spearing through Armando's chest before the mutant could recover. Just before it exploded, I fed the reaction a trickle of Anathema Flame.
The resulting explosion created a shockwave that traveled hundreds of miles and shattered the windows of skyscrapers and rattled cars. I brought my hands together, containing the reaction and compressing it.
Inside the inferno, I felt Armando buck and resist, rapidly adapting before eventually collapsing as I modulated the heat, ramping it up until sweat poured from my brow.
I drew in the flame that remained, absorbing it into myself, and with a wave of my wings, I found myself hovering over the team, who looked up at me, like I was some kind of God. Well, Demi-God.
"Is everyone okay?" I asked.
"Been better," Jessica Jones spat blood out the side of her mouth. "What kept you so long?"
"Shutting down a dimensional gateway isn't exactly light work," I said. "We should be demon free now. At least for the immediate future." My mind reached out, touching two other battlefields. Rin was mixing it up with Garrett and winning, and Jean was fighting a dozen Laurens with the Ten Rings and her Adamantium daggers.
Peter was somewhere under the rubble, holding onto life.
"You should help with the evacuation," I said. "Rin, Pete, and Jean need me. Any idea where the rest of Shield magically disappeared to?"
There should've been hundreds of personnel, not to mention Tony, Captain America, Hawkeye, Natasha, and the other mutants.
"Evacuating the city," Daredevil provided. "The X-Men, the Brotherhood, and the sorcerers have also joined in."
I nodded. I liked the sound of that.
"I owe you all a drink when this is all over," I said.
"You've given us more than enough," Colleen Wing said. "Now go. This isn't over yet."
"No, it's not."
I shot off with a flap of my wings, hurtling towards Garret and Rin's positions.
They slingshotted each other through buildings and sub-levels, cracking the ground, air, and everything else around them, coming to a brutal stop right before they bowled through a school bus filled with panicking kids.
Gritting his teeth, Rin held Garrett back, drinking in shimmering black energy that coated Garrett's skin.
Haki.
Garrett tried headbutting the Cambion, but he got to him first, sending a beam of whitish energy straight into his chest, putting him through several buildings. Rin accelerated and was just about to intercept him. I stepped in, channeling Wind manipulation and Time Warp.
My wings flashed blue-green before I split Garrett into two with Kurogiri and Dimensional slash.
My attack, though restrained, left a thick line in the foundation of the building he was stumbling out of. Garrett's confused eyes met mine before he collapsed like a marionette with its string cut, blood gushing out. With a wave of my hand, I sent him into my inventory space.
I received no notification for killing him, just like the other Shin agents.
"Hey!" Rin yelled, touching down beside me. "That was my kill."
"You were taking your sweet time. Jean and Peter need us."
Rin blinked. "Not really surprised about Pete, but Jean? That Lauren chick can't be that tough? Can she?"
"Jean is still fighting her."
"Let's get to it then," Rin cracked his neck and summoned his sword from the inventory ring. "Still think you're not giving her enough credit. I bet she's nearly done."
I took off with a flap of my wings, racing to SHIELD HQ. Rin was behind me, propelling himself forward with powerful, controlled leaps that barely cracked the ground with each jump. He continued our conversation telepathically.
"And I think you're underestimating Shin's agents," I said. "Armando and the rest weren't particularly hard to beat, so that leaves her."
"I think you and everybody else have very different definitions of 'hard to beat," Rin sent. "You're too overpowered. You and Jean. I mean, she's the Avatar of some space chicken, and you're a Nephilim with bullshit fire magic that can melt anything."
"And you're a Cambion who didn't have to sell his soul to gain power," I said. "Shin has his hooks in me, and the Phoenix has her hooks in Jean. We march to their drums, whether we like it or not."
"But you're working on an exit strategy, right?"
"I am," I said. After our little display, Magneto would be more than a little bit interested, which meant he'd be primed to receive my offer. All that was left was Belasco's firstborn…who I was beginning to rethink handing over limitless power to.
One of the mutants might be a better fit. Ilyana maybe. I hoped she wasn't as crazy as Storm.
"Just have to make sure I get to the stones before they do. Right now, Jean is the only thing standing between me and an eternity of servitude. I trust her, but you can't blame a brother for trying to be thorough."
We arrived at the ruins of the SHIELD office with an explosion of wind and energy, touching down on the outskirts and watching the fight up close.
Jean remained rooted in front of a door with massive orbs of Phoenix fire hovering over her shoulder and several knives flanking her, breath heavy. Her forearms glowed with the powers of the 10 Rings
Lauren stood opposite her with 10 clones, each holding a bloody knife and gun. She had a wicked smile on her face.