*RIIIIIP*
The spatial tear spat me out into the dimness room. Stone walls slick with moisture, decay and forgotten corners where maintenance never bothered crawling. My boots hit the floor with a creak that echoed too long in the confined space.
Gasper hung against the far wall like a broken puppet.
Golden light blazed around him. Intricate magic circle etched directly into crumbling stone with binding glyphs. His small frame sagged against invisible restraints, arms spread wide in mockery of crucifixion, silver hair plastered to his forehead with sweat. Blood trickled from his nose, painting his lips crimson.
They really went all in on the dramatic villainy aesthetic, didn't they? Next they'll start cackling and monologuing about their master plan.
Six magicians stood in a loose semicircle before him. Women, all of them. Robes the color of pitch black swept the floor, hoods hiding their faces underneath. Their hands moved in synchronized gestures, weaving threads of power that kept Gasper pinned, kept his Sacred Gear active against his will.
The kid's eyes were squeezed shut, tears leaking from the corners. His whole body trembled—not just from pain, but from fear so deep it had soaked into his bones. He looked like every nightmare he'd ever had was happening simultaneously.
All of a sudden, one of them jerked backward, her chant stuttering "How?! We negated teleportation magic! The barriers—"
"Yeah, about that" I stepped forward, shrugging nonchalantly "Well, my sword doesn't really give a damn about your barriers. It just cuts through them. Along with space. And all that chanting stuff. And whatever passes for reality around here. Soon it will cut through your confidence too, judging by that face you're making"
"Ladies," I said, stopping a hand distance in front of them "I'm going to need you to step away from the kid"
The tall one's face twisted in anger "You dare—"
"Yeah, I dare. Shocking, I know. A lowly reincarnated devil showing up uninvited. It's almost like your plan had some holes in it. Holes about... oh, this big." I held up my hands about shoulder-width apart. "Roughly the size of a spatial tear."
The temperature plummeted.
Frost crept across stone in spiderwebbing patterns, crystallizing moisture into diamond dust that glittered in the golden light. My breath misted. Their breath misted. The air itself seemed to contract, pulling tight around us like a noose.
The magicians stumbled back, their synchronized movements breaking apart like shattered glass. One of them—younger, with panic bleeding through her painted marks—raised a trembling hand.
"He's using ice magic—"
Ice shards materialized around me—dozens of them, floating in orbital rings like satellites made of frozen malice. Each one the length of my forearm, edges honed to absolute sharpness, reflecting distorted images of the magicians' pale faces.
Look at them. They're realizing they fucked up. That moment when the prey becomes the predator and you're standing there wondering when exactly your brilliant plan turned into a funeral service.
The tall one snarled, fear transforming into desperation "Kill him! Now!"
They moved in unison.
Hands thrust forward in perfect unison, their training was solid—magic circles erupting to life in bursts of sickly green luminescence. Fire, lightning, force—elemental fury channeled with practiced precision, converging on my position from six different vectors.
My ice shards lanced forward.
CRASH.
Magic collided with ice in midair—explosions of steam and screaming energy that filled the chamber with roiling mist. The fog swallowed everything, thick and opaque, turning the world into cotton-stuffed nightmare where shapes moved without definition.
But I didn't need to see them.
I could feel their heartbeats through the ice crystals in the air. Each pulse, each breath, each terrified thought practically screamed their locations.
SWOOSH
The first magician saw nothing—just mist parting around sudden presence before ice encased her from feet to crown. Her scream died half-formed as frost sealed her mouth shut, trapped her lungs mid-breath. The ice spread like cancer, crystallizing flesh and bone and whatever passed for soul in these things.
The second turned toward the sound—instinct, really, the worst possible choice—and ice climbed her legs before she could process what that meant. It wrapped her torso, swallowed her reaching hands. Her eyes went wide, pupils contracting to pinpoints as the cold invaded her marrow, as understanding crashed down too late to matter.
Three, four, five, six—they fell in rapid succession, each one a statue added to my growing collection. Their expressions froze mid-terror, monuments to the precise moment they realized exactly how outclassed they were.
The mist cleared slowly, revealing my handiwork.
Six ice sculptures stood in perfect silence, faces caught in eternal screams, hands raised in futile wards. Frost crawled across their surfaces in delicate fractals, beautiful and absolutely merciless.
You know, I should feel bad about this. Probably. Normal people would feel something—guilt, remorse, maybe a little existential crisis about the casual brutality. But these assholes were torturing a scared kid, so... yeah. My sympathy meter is reading precisely zero.
I walked past them without a second glance, boots crunching over frost-covered stone.
"I-I am sorr..."
Gasper's voice barely qualified as whisper.
The kid was a mess. Blood from his nose had dried in crusty trails down to his chin. His red eyes, usually so timid they could barely meet anyone's gaze, were swollen from crying. But worse than the physical damage was the look on his face.
Shame.
Pure, unadulterated shame, like he'd personally failed everyone who'd ever cared about him.
"I'm sorry." The words tumbled out of him in a rush, desperate and broken. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I caused trouble again, I'm always causing trouble, I should've been stronger, I should've fought back, but I couldn't—" His voice cracked "I'm too weak. I'm always too weak. Everyone has to save me and I can't do anything and—"
"Gasper"
He flinched at his own name.
Tears carved clean lines through the grime on his cheeks, falling faster now, each one carrying the weight of every time he'd called himself useless, every time he'd apologized for existing.
Fuck. This kid's drowning in self-loathing so deep he can't even see the surface anymore.
I knelt before him, the motion slow and deliberate like you'd use approaching a wounded animal.
His breathing hitched—short, panicked gasps that spoke of someone expecting punishment, expecting disappointment, expecting everything except what he actually needed.
My hand came up. Settled on his head.
Pat.
Gasper went completely still. His eyes widened—shock replacing fear, confusion bleeding through tears.
Pat.
"Listen to me very carefully," I said, keeping my voice level. Firm but not harsh. "You're not weak."
"But I—"
"No" Another pat, a little firmer "You're scared. There's a difference. A huge difference that apparently nobody's bothered explaining to you."
He stared at me, tears still falling but his breathing starting to slow.
"Weak people break when they're turned into weapons" I continued. "They shatter. They give up. They let the fear consume them until there's nothing left" I met his eyes "But you didn't break, Gasper. You're still here. Still fighting, even if you don't realize that's what you're doing. You continued to survive being used, being controlled, being treated like an object instead of a person. That's not weakness. That's strength to rise despite troubles, you don't know how to recognize yet."
Fresh tears fell, but these ones were different. Cleaner, somehow. Less poisoned.
"I don't... I don't feel strong," he whispered.
"Yeah, well, strong people rarely do. The ones who constantly tell you how strong they are? Usually compensating for something they are scared to face themselves" I gave him one more pat, then stood, helping him up as the binding magic dissolved around him—golden light fragmenting into motes that drifted away like fireflies dying at dawn.
He swayed on unsteady legs. I kept one hand on his shoulder, steadying him.
"You being fearful' I said, watching his face "is not weakness. It keeps you alive. It tells you when danger's real. But it's also a liar. It tells you you're worthless when you're not. It tells you everyone's disappointed when they're actually worried about you. It tells you you're a burden when really, you're just someone who needs help right now. And needing help? That's not weakness either. That's being human. Or... you know, dhampir. Whatever."
A sound escaped him—half laugh, half sob, entirely surprised.
There we go. Kid's actually hearing me instead of just running his internal dialogue of self-hatred on repeat.
He wiped his face with the back of his hand, smearing blood and tears together "Do you really mean that?"
"Would I waste time lying to someone while there's a giant dragon-eating abomination outside and magicians summoning apocalypse-level threats?" I raised an eyebrow "I'm brutally honest when it counts, Gasper. Ask anyone in the peerage. They'll tell you I'm an asshole about it sometimes"
Another small, watery laugh.
My expression shifted then "But right now, I need you to do something for me."
He straightened slightly, wiping his eyes again. "What?"
"I'm sending you somewhere safe. When you get there, you stay put. You don't come back here. You don't try to help. You just wait until someone comes to get you. Can you do that?"
Fear flickered across his face again—different fear this time. Not of me, but of being left behind, of being useless again.
"I know what you're thinking," I said before he could voice it. "You're thinking this is just another way of saying you're too weak to fight. It's not. This is me recognizing that you've been through enough today, you're injured, and throwing you into a battle against things that would kill you isn't bravery. It's stupidity. And I don't do stupidity if I can avoid it."
I drew Yamato. The blade sang as it left the sheath, a note of pure lethality that resonated in the bones.
"Besides," I added, slashing vertical then horizontal, watching reality tear along those cuts like fabric under razors, "someone needs to survive to tell everyone what happened here. Just in case things go sideways and we all die horribly. You know, for posterity."
"That's not funny," Gasper said, but there was the tiniest hint of a smile tugging at his lips.
"Wasn't trying to be funny. I'm genuinely concerned about the paperwork if we all die. Rias would be so annoyed."
The spatial tear opened before us—darkness swirling with impossible depths, edges crackling with unstable energy.
Gasper hesitated at the threshold, pale face turned toward me with questions he didn't quite know how to ask.
"Go," I said, gentler this time.
He took a breath. Nodded. Started to step forward, then—
"?"
"Yeah?"
"Thank you. For... for not treating me like I'm not worthless."
I smiled as He stumbled forward, crossed through, and the spatial tear sealed behind him with a sound like thunder collapsing inward.
Silence rushed in to fill the space he'd occupied.
Better him out there than in here. Kid's nowhere near confident enough to fight these assholes, and throwing him into this mess would just traumatize him more. He needs more of a therapy, not battlefield experience. Though knowing this universe, he'll probably get both whether he wants them or not.
I moved to the window—grimy glass overlooking the academy grounds transformed into war zone.
Samael writhed below, massive beyond reason, each movement sending shockwaves that cracked pavement and shattered windows. The thing was crucified—actually nailed to a giant cross like some twisted religious imagery meets kaiju nightmare—but that didn't seem to be slowing it down much. Tentacles whipped out from its lower body, each one thick enough to use as a bridge.
Because of course the Dragon Eater has tentacles. Why wouldn't it? This universe looked at Lovecraft and the Berserk, shook them together in a blender, and decided 'yes, this is fine, let's traumatize everyone.'
Vali darted around it like a minnow harassing a whale, azure wings blazing trails of light. Divine Dividing's power flared with each pass, halving Samael's strength over and over, but the thing just kept regenerating.
Sirzechs's demonic power painted the sky crimson—actual blood-red energy that looked like someone had set the atmosphere on fire. Serafall's ice magic created temporary barriers that Samael's tentacles couldn't smashed through.
Azazel fired light spears with precision born from millennia of warfare, each one aimed at vital points that would've killed anything else. On Samael, they just looked like acupuncture needles on a particularly angry elephant.
Michael's holy energy seared wherever it landed, burning corruption from scales the size of houses. The Archangel fought with the grace of someone who'd been doing this since before humans invented the wheel, but even he looked strained.
And there—Grayfia, crumpled against rubble, silver hair matted with blood.
My stomach clenched. The Strongest Queen, reduced to that. Whatever had hit her had hit hard.
Asia knelt beside her, green light pouring from trembling hands as Twilight Healing worked to close wounds that kept reopening. The nun's face was set in determined concentration, but I could see the fear in her eyes. She wasn't used to healing injuries this severe.
*At least Asia's safe-ish. Behind rubble. Away from the main fighting. Small mercies in this clusterfuck.*
Higher up, Rias, Akeno, and Sona formed a triangle pattern, power crackling between them as they faced—
Oh.
Oh no.
Katerea Leviathan.
The descendant floated in the air like she owned it, purple hair whipping in winds created by her own magic. Her laugh carried across the battlefield, sharp and mocking, a sound that belonged to those who'd never known true defeat.
This is just what this situation needed. It's like someone looked at this battle and thought 'you know what would make this better? More narcissistic villains with god complexes.'*
She gestured languidly, and magic circles bloomed around her like toxic flowers—purple, black, sickly green, colors that had no business existing in nature.
"You lowly outsiders dare challenge me?" Her voice carried, amplified by magic or ego or both "I am Katerea Leviathan! Heir to true power! You new Satans and your pet devils are nothing but—"
*She's monologuing. She's actually monologuing. Does nobody in this universe understand that monologuing is how you get killed? It's like Villain 101: Don't Give The Heroes Time To Plan.*
I didn't wait for her to finish her speech.
Darkness wrapped around me.
Assault Mode ignited with a sensation like stepping into a furnace—if the furnace was made of condensed malevolence and bad life choices. Power flooded my veins, demonic energy concentrated to levels that made reality flinch away like a dog that had been kicked too many times.
The mark blazed to life on my forehead. I could feel it burning, not painfully but present, like someone had branded my skull with the world's most aggressive mood ring.
Black wings erupted from my back.
The sensation was bizarre—feeling limbs that shouldn't exist, controlling muscles that didn't follow human anatomy. Darkness given form and function, each feather edged with crimson light that looked like someone had dipped them in liquid violence.
Still not used to this. Probably never will be. Having wings is weird. Flying is weirder. The fact that my brain just knows how to use them is the weirdest part of all.
I launched through the window.
Glass exploded outward in glittering rain—because apparently I was incapable of using doors like a normal person. Wind screamed past my face as I accelerated, the ground falling away in a blur of motion and violence.
My eyes tracked the battlefield, calculating vectors and trajectories with demonic precision.
Katerea's magic circle blazed to life above Sona—massive, complex, power gathering at its center in a sphere of concentrated destruction. The descendant's face twisted in cruel delight, the expression of someone who enjoyed causing pain.
Sona was still recovering from her previous attack. Her glasses sat askew on her face, one lens cracked. Her breathing came hard and fast, exhaustion written in every line of her body. She was raising a defensive magic circle , but I could see from here it wouldn't be enough.
The attack was already launching.
Nope. Not happening. Not on my watch.
I hit the space between them at speed that bent air into visible compression waves—physics crying in the corner about how I was violating its rules. My arm wrapped around Sona's waist just as Katerea's attack released.
Purple lightning ionized the air where Sona had been a fraction of a second earlier. The scent of ozone and burned atmosphere filled my nose. Too close. Way too close.
Sona gasped—a sharp intake of breath that spoke of someone whose life had just flashed before their eyes. Her head whipped around to find me holding her, suspended in midair by wings that shouldn't exist, wearing a demonic mark that probably looked like something out of her nightmares.
Her violet eyes went wide behind cracked lenses. Mouth opening around words that wouldn't come. Color flooded her cheeks—crimson spreading from neck to hairline like someone had dumped paint over her head.
We hung there for a moment, me holding her bridal style, her staring at me like I'd just materialized out of thin air.
Which, technically, I kind of had.
"Are you alright?" I asked, because what else do you say when you've just princess-carried the student council president away from certain death?
She blinked. Once. Twice. Her brain was clearly rebooting, trying to process the situation.
"I—you—yes, I'm—" Sona stammered, which was probably the first time in her life she'd stammered. Her hands came up to push at my chest, but she seemed unable to actually look away from my face. "Put me down. Now. Please."
Oh good, she's gone from 'shocked speechless' to 'mortified and trying to pretend she has dignity.' That's the Sona I know.
"Sure thing, Student Council President."
I set her down on a nearby rooftop, gentle as handling glass. She immediately stepped back, adjusting her glasses with trembling fingers, trying desperately to reclaim her composure.
"Isaiah-kun!"
Rias's voice cut through the chaos, sharp with concern and relief tangled together. She flew closer, Akeno at her side. Both of them looked like they'd been through hell—Rias's hair was singed at the ends, Akeno had blood trickling from a cut above her eye—but they were alive, functional, ready to keep fighting.
The relief on Rias's face when she saw me was palpable, but it shifted almost immediately to worry "Where's Gasper?" Her eyes darted behind me, searching for the small dhampir. "Don't tell me he—"
Fear crept into her expression—the kind of fear that came from imagining worst-case scenarios, from being responsible for people she cared about and knowing she couldn't always protect them.
"He's fine" I replied "Sent him somewhere safe, there is nothing to worry about"
The relief that crashed across her features was immediate "I was worried they'd—" She cut herself off, shaking her head "Never mind. You got him out. That's what matters."
Akeno smiled, there was genuine gratitude in her eyes for seeing me alright in this chaos.
"How touching"
Katerea's voice dripped venom and amusement in equal measure. She floated above us, arms crossed, smirk painted across her features like she'd practiced it in a mirror.
Purple power crackled around her like contained lightning. Her eyes gleamed with malice and superiority, the look of someone who'd never been genuinely challenged and didn't know what failure tasted like.
"You think saving one pathetic vampire means you've succeeded, Knight of Rias Gremory?" She laughed—high, cruel, grating "You're all just playthings for those with true power. The blood of the original Leviathan flows through my veins. What flows through yours? Mediocrity? Desperation?"
Oh good, she's doing the whole 'bloodline superiority' speech. Right up there with 'you'll never defeat me' and 'I am inevitable' on the Greatest Hits of Villains About to Lose.*
"Wow" I said, letting my voice carry "Did you rehearse that? Because it sounded rehearsed. Very... theatrical. I appreciate the effort you put into your villain speeches. Really, top marks for commitment"
Her smirk faltered. Just for a second.
"I'm going to enjoy making you scream" she hissed, glaring at me.
"That's what my last opponent said. And the ones before them. There's actually a waiting list at this point. You'll have to stand in a queue for your turn"
LostVayne materialized in my hand, blade catching the light and reflecting Katerea's increasingly annoyed face.
I looked at Rias, Akeno, Sona "Handle the magicians. I got her"
Rias hesitated. I could see the calculation in her eyes—weighing my abilities against Katerea's power, trying to decide if she should argue, if she should insist on helping.
Then she nodded.
Because she'd seen what I could do. Watched me dismantle Kokabiel, survive assassination attempts that should've killed me three times over, walk through violence like it was a normal thing for me at this point.
Akeno's smile turned sharp "Don't take too long, Isaiah-kun. We wouldn't want to miss the fun."
Sona adjusted her glasses, composure mostly recovered. "Be careful." A pause. "And thank you. For earlier."
*Oh, she's still embarrassed. That's actually kind of adorable. Not that I'll ever tell her that. She'd probably try to kill me"
They dove away, power trailing behind them as they engaged the magicians still summoning horrors from dimensional tears—creatures that probably had too many limbs and not enough adherence to euclidean geometry.
I glanced toward the main battle. Grayfia was standing now, Asia's healing having worked its miracle. The Strongest Queen looked pissed—the kind of cold fury that came from being injured badly enough to require rescue. Together with Asia, they focused on the massive summoning circle that kept spitting out magicians in endless waves.
Good. That meant I could give Katerea my full attention.
My hand went to my neck, fingers closing around the pendant hidden beneath my shirt. I pulled it free—thin chain, small vial dangling from it, liquid inside catching light like captured darkness.
I held it up, letting it dangle "Which one of you was behind it?"
Katerea's smirk widened into something triumphant—the expression of someone who thought they knew a secret "He was right about you" Her voice practically purred with satisfaction "You are not some foolish lowly reincarnated devil after all."
Her hands moved, magic circles erupting around her in constellations of purple light. Each one rotated at different speeds, different angles, building power
She tilted her head, mock-sympathetic. "Shame you'll die without answers."
Shame you'll die without answers.' Really? REALLY? Did she get her dialogue from a bargain bin villain playbook? What's next, 'you'll never stop me' and an evil cackle?
She unleashed hell.
Lightning, fire, force—magical attacks streamed from every circle simultaneously, converging on my position from a dozen vectors. The air screamed. Energy seared. Reality bent under the concentrated assault like someone was using spacetime as a stress ball.
Okay, points for enthusiasm. Negative points for originality. This is basically 'throw everything at him and hope something sticks.
I moved.
Weaving between attacks that could vaporize mountains, my body twisting through impossible angles as demonic reflexes pushed past human limitation. The first lightning bolt scorched past my face close enough to smell ozone—burnt metal and ionized air. Fire bloomed where I'd been a heartbeat earlier, superheated air expanding in a miniature explosion. Force blasts cratered the air behind me, pressure waves that would've turned my skeleton into powder.
But none of them connected.
Because Katerea was powerful, sure. Descendant of Leviathan, legacy of the original Satan, all that impressive lineage. But she fought like someone who'd never had to actually try—all power, no precision. Overwhelming force without direction.
I'd fought Kokabiel. A Cadre-class Fallen Angel who'd spent millennia perfecting the art of killing. Who'd survived the Great War through skill and cunning and sheer murderous competence.
Katerea had spent her time... what? Sitting in her descendant compound, polishing her superiority complex?
"I'll never reveal that information!" she shrieked, voice climbing into registers that probably annoyed dogs three cities over. "Even if I die here today!"
*Ah, the classic 'I'll die before I talk' line. Which usually precedes talking immediately before dying. The irony is always delicious.*
Black miasma erupted around her like oil given consciousness. It writhed, twisted, formed into serpents—dozens of them, each as thick as tree trunks, fangs dripping poison that hissed where it hit stone. The snakes coiled around her body, layer upon layer of corrupted power.
Okay, that was actually kind of impressive. Disturbing, but impressive.
Her laugh rang out, shrill and overconfident. "With this power, I'm unstoppable! The blood of the original Leviathan flows through me! You're nothing!"
And there's the monologue. Right on schedule. Why do villains always—ALWAYS—feel the need to explain how powerful they are before they lose? It's like they have a checklist: Step one, summon impressive power. Step two, announce how unstoppable you are. Step three, get absolutely wrecked by protagonist.
Purple flames erupted along LostVayne's edge—Hellblaze, fire that burned soul and body equally, flames that didn't extinguish until nothing remained.
"Enchant: Hellblaze."
The words felt right. Like clicking a key into a lock that was made for it.
I vanished.
Not teleportation. Pure speed. Demonic power channeled through muscles designed for violence, acceleration that left afterimages burned into air. The world slowed down—not literally, but perceptually, my brain processing information faster than it had any right to.
Katerea's eyes widened. The snakes lunged, jaws opening around screams that sounded almost human. Too slow.
I was already past them.
LostVayne moved in patterns too fast to track—muscle memory from powers I'd gained, techniques I'd absorbed, fighting styles that had been uploaded directly into my head like a particularly violent software update.
Each cut was precise as surgical incision. Exact angles. Perfect depth. The kind of precision that came from doing something so many times it became automatic.
"Divine Thousand Cuts."
The technique's name fell from my lips, and I passed through her.
For a moment, nothing happened.
The world held its breath.
Katerea hung in the air, expression frozen in shock. Her mouth was open around a scream she couldn't voice. The snakes had stopped mid-lunge, suspended like someone had hit pause on reality.
Then the cuts appeared.
Thin lines of purple fire traced across her body—hundreds of them, thousands, mapping every inch of skin and scale and corruption. They appeared all at once, a geometric pattern of destruction that looked almost beautiful in its complexity.
The snakes dissolved into ash. Just... gone. Centuries-old corruption evaporating like morning fog.
The miasma followed—wisps of darkness pulled apart by purple flames, screaming as they died.
Her power guttered and died like a candle in a hurricane.
And she dropped.
CRASH.
Her body cratered pavement, cracks spiderwebbing outward from the impact like a shattered mirror. Blood pooled beneath her, dark against broken stone, spreading in rivulets that followed the cracks.
She stared up at the sky with eyes that couldn't quite process what had happened. Shock. Confusion. The first stirrings of actual fear.
That's the look. The moment when arrogance meets reality and reality wins. Never gets old.
I landed beside her, boots clicking against cracked ground. LostVayne shifted in my hand, blade dissolving into golden light that scattered like dying fireflies.
A different weapon materialized.
Thin rapier, elegant in its simplicity, edge gleaming with truth-seeking enchantments. The blade was almost translucent, like someone had forged it from crystallized honesty. Light bent around it in strange ways.
The Truth-Seeking Sword.
A weapon that made lies impossible, that dragged honesty from even the most stubborn mouths. The kind of thing that made interrogations very short and very unpleasant for the interrogatee.
I pressed the point against her chest, just above her heart. Not deep enough to kill. Deep enough to bind. Deep enough that the enchantments could sink their unseen teeth into her.
Katerea's eyes widened as she felt the magic take hold. Her mouth opened, probably to curse me or threaten me or continue being generally unpleasant.
"Who was behind the vial?"
Her mouth moved without her permission. The words spilled out like water from cracked vessel, pulled by magic stronger than her will to resist.
"Euclid... Lucifuge..."
The system notification blazed across my vision, sharp and immediate:
> [Quest Complete: Discover the individual behind your assassination attempt]
>
> [Reward: 1 Character Card ]
Euclid Lucifuge
Grayfia's brother?!
The guy who went full Old Satan Faction zealot and got himself banished for it. The one who couldn't accept that the world had moved on from the Great War, that the old ways were dead and buried.
But why me?
The question burned in my mind. What did I do to warrant assassination? I was just a reincarnated devil who happened to be slightly less useless than expected. I hadn't killed anyone important, hadn't interfered with any major plots yet, so why?
Unless... unless it's not about what I've done. It's about what I could do. What I represent. A reincarnated devil with multiple powers that shouldn't exist, power that doesn't follow the rules, rising through the ranks faster than anyone expected.
To someone like Euclid, obsessed with bloodline purity and traditional power structures, I'm probably a walking insult to everything he believes in.
"Why does he want me dead?"
The Truth-Seeking Sword pulsed, demanding answers. Katerea's face twisted—she was fighting it, trying to resist, but the magic was relentless.
Her eyes widened. Fear—real, genuine terror—flooded her features like ice water in her veins "He said—he said you were—"
*BOOOOM!*
Her body detonated from within, self-destruct magic triggered by some failsafe I hadn't detected. Light erupted outward in a sphere of annihilation—raw destructive force that consumed flesh and bone and blood in an instant.
I threw myself backward, wings propelling me away from the blast radius. Heat washed over me, scorching, cooking the air in my lungs. Pressure slammed into my chest like a battering ram, driving the air from my lungs.
When the light faded, nothing remained.
No body. No blood. Not even ash.
Just a crater—perfectly circular, edges glowing with residual heat—and the faint smell of ozone mixed with something that might've been sulfur.
*Well. That's not ominous at all.*
I floated in the air, staring at the empty crater.
Self-destruct protocols to keep secrets. Built into her own body. Whatever Euclid's planning, he's paranoid enough to rig his own allies with suicide bombs just to protect information.
Fantastic. Love that for me. Really makes me feel warm and fuzzy about my chances of survival.
Then a Movement caught my eye.
Massive magic circle appearing beneath Samael—dimensional patterns so complex they hurt to look at, like someone had written mathematics in a language that predated numbers. The Dragon Eater thrashed, its tentacles whipping wildly as dimensional magic wrapped around it like chains made of reality itself.
The thing was being dragged back. Pulled toward wherever it had been summoned from, kicking and screaming and destroying everything in reach.
The faction leaders stood in formation below—Michael's wings still blazing with holy light, Sirzechs radiating crimson power that made the air shimmer, Serafall's ice coating the ground in elaborate patterns, Azazel looking characteristically casual despite clearly being exhausted.
They looked like they'd been through a blender. Clothes torn, minor injuries visible even from here. But they were standing victorious.
Four of the strongest beings in existence, working together to send back one monster. That's... actually kind of terrifying when you think about it. How many things in this universe require that level of coordinated effort to deal with?
Wait.
I counted them again.
Michael. Sirzechs. Serafall. Azazel.
Someone was missing.
Where was—
*SWOOSH!*
Then a massive, overwhelming blurred at me from my blindspot like a freight train made of murder and bad intentions.
Every instinct I had screamed danger.
I twisted midair, wings flaring, bringing my hand up on pure instinct.
My fingers closed around a fist.
A fist that would have caved in my skull like an eggshell, would have turned my brain into paste, would have ended this fight before it began.
*BOOOOOM!*
The shockwave from our collision shattered every window within fifty meters. Glass exploded outward in glittering cascades. Cracks spiderwebbed across the ground beneath where we floated, concrete groaning under the pressure.
My arm screamed protest—bones grinding together under force that could split mountains, muscles tearing from the strain of stopping something that shouldn't be stopped.
White armor. Azure wings, crystalline and beautiful and absolutely lethal. Yellow eyes burning with barely-contained violence, with the kind of eagerness that belonged to apex predators who'd just found worthy prey.
Vali.
In his Scale Mail.
Divine Dividing manifested in full glory, power radiating from every plate and joint. The armor looked alive, organic almost, white dragon scales that seemed to shift and move with each breath. Light played across its surface in hypnotic patterns.
I bet He was grinning like a kid on Christmas morning who'd just found out all the presents were exactly what he wanted.
He is indeed a true battle junkie.
And I'd just proven I could smash Katerea Leviathan without breaking a sweat.
Which meant, in Vali's mind, I'd just painted a giant target on my back that said 'FIGHT ME!*
"What's the meaning of this, White Dragon Emperor?"
Well, I knew this gonna happen. But I must make it worth the gacha ticket.
. . .
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