Apokolips's two de facto rulers deliberated in silence. They absolutely could not go out. A reserve force had to be maintained in case of ambush. A few exchanged glances said it all: doing nothing beat doing the wrong thing.
"She's gotten stronger..." Steppenwolf watched the Apokolips army crash against Thea like waves against a cliff—each wave surging forward, each returning as artistically arranged corpses. His confidence was quietly eroding.
DeSaad had no intention of stepping out to challenge her either. He knew Thea was a spellcasting god. As for why she was using swords instead of magic—he interpreted it as bait, a lure to draw him into range. He definitely couldn't beat her, especially after watching Kanto get decapitated in three moves. The word "counterattack" never crossed his lips.
As for calling the boss—Darkseid—neither of them entertained the thought.
Their lord had stormed off to bed in a foul mood. Waking him now meant explaining: There's one enemy outside, and we can't handle her. You'd better come deal with it yourself. Darkseid's inevitable response: You can't even handle one enemy and need me to step in? Why don't you all just die?
Darkseid's temper was legendary across the multiverse. Thea's two old friends chose the safest option: spectate. Or, as they preferred to frame it, "rear-echelon command and coordination."
That strategy lasted about five minutes.
Thea was killing too efficiently. Reports poured in—Kalibak was clinging to life by a thread; Kanto was confirmed dead. Even though New Gods never truly died, he wouldn't be back on his feet for a thousand years or so.
Granny Goodness had tried to be underhanded—she and three Female Furies had hidden in the shadows for an ambush. It ended in fewer than twenty exchanges: two Furies down, one critically wounded. Granny herself only survived because she ran fast enough.
They were terrified. But Thea, truth be told, was starting to get nervous too. The killing had vented her bloodlust. The Godhood of Death was attuning to her more smoothly with every soul claimed. And with that, her natural caution—her instinct for self-preservation—was reasserting itself.
Where was Darkseid? Why hadn't he come out? She'd turned his front yard into a charnel house. How could he sit through this kind of humiliation?
Was he sick? Or just not home? Thea figured if someone were massacring people on her territory, she'd have been out in a heartbeat. Darkseid's restraint couldn't possibly be this good.
Her pace slowed involuntarily. The bold strides gave way to cautious half-steps, inching forward.
It wasn't until Steppenwolf, DeSaad, and the remaining members of Darkseid's Elite emerged together that she stopped. She addressed them as casually as a neighbor dropping by. "Where's Darkseid?"
Steppenwolf desperately wanted to say The boss isn't home, please come back another time. But the other New Gods had decided that since he was Darkseid's uncle, the honor of speaking first naturally belonged to him. In perfect unison, they took one step backward.
Are you kidding me?! Steppenwolf nearly swore out loud. These bastards—elbowing each other aside when there was power to grab, but the moment things got dangerous, he was the one left holding the bag.
He couldn't exactly retreat. He lifted his chin and declared, "You want to see His Majesty? Get through us first."
In his mind, this was where Thea would reconsider. Their side had the remaining six members of Darkseid's Elite.
Among them, Mantis was the strongest—a god who'd withstood three moves from Highfather during the war a millennium ago. Even Darkseid spoke highly of him. Add Steppenwolf himself, DeSaad, Granny Goodness, Doctor Bedlam, and Virman Vundabar, and there weren't many beings in the entire universe who could beat them as a unit.
What he absolutely did not expect was for Thea to break into a smile as radiant as dawn. "Oh, plenty of fight in you! Let me see what Darkseid's Elite can really do." She flicked the blood from her blades and charged without another word.
"You have a death wish, New God!" Mantis wore emerald-green armor, his voice carrying a note of age, but his movements were razor-sharp. His right hand opened—five fingers hard as tempered steel—and caught her incoming blade bare-handed.
Clang. The unstoppable edge, stopped. Not because his claws were harder than the sword, but because Thea's strike had lost more than half its force—the divine power coating the blade had been siphoned away.
"Ha! See that? Any magic, any energy—I absorb it all. You're finished!" Mantis bellowed, triumphant. The other New Gods visibly relaxed. Thea's earlier killing intent had been suffocating.
"Fool." He was absorbing the divine power of death. Thea didn't even know what to say to that. If he wanted to die, slitting his own throat would have been faster. Why absorb her power?
She pressed forward. Twin swords danced, pulling all six gods into her striking distance.
Mantis held the center, absorbing the brunt of her offensive. Steppenwolf rotated in and out, blocking a blow here, landing an axe-swing there. Granny Goodness wielded a long spear, looking for openings to backstab.
The outer ring was ranged support. Virman Vundabar—the weakest—was limited to an energy pistol. Doctor Bedlam, a rare psychic, hammered continuously at Thea's mind. DeSaad, the strongest of the three, handled ranged pressure.
The six gods' coordination wasn't seamless, but each played to their strengths. By their own estimation, only Darkseid himself could defeat this formation.
"You're annoying." Thea abandoned finesse. She merged her twin blades into one, freeing her left hand. A Shadow Flame—aimed straight at Doctor Bedlam. The wraith was the hardest to defend against; he looked like a Dementor—a dark, ragged cloak over nothing—and his psychic interference was relentless.
The Godhood of Death elevated her spellwork to a level no ancient grand sorcerer could have imagined. What should have been alternating dark-red flames had become pure black, and within them, burning as fuel, she could make out humanoid shapes—the souls of the fodder she'd killed earlier.
Virman Vundabar didn't think twice. Shield up, dodge sideways. DeSaad blinked away. Doctor Bedlam, whose abilities were similar to the Martian Manhunter's, chose to phase-shift, attempting to slip out of the material plane and let the attack pass through him.
He'd underestimated what soul magic plus death could do. Countless wraiths invaded the subspace and, to his abject horror, dragged him back into the physical world. That momentary delay was all it took—the death flames were already upon him.
"Idiot!" Mantis broke from the melee with two rapid strikes, leapt clear, and—banking on his ability to absorb any magic—planted himself in front of Doctor Bedlam without hesitation, tanking the blast.
Death flames. He absorbed a little under half before something felt wrong. His body seemed to have slowed by a fraction of a beat—barely perceptible.
He dismissed it, stubbornly convinced it was some kind of deceleration effect baked into her magic.
"Heh." Thea's laughter rang out, bright as silver bells. He'd called someone else a fool, but he was the biggest fool of all.
Death wasn't magic. It wasn't telekinesis. It wasn't psychic energy. There was no such thing as an absolute in this universe, and energy-absorption physiology had its ceiling. The only reason Mantis hadn't exploded already was that he was a powerful New God. Anyone else who tried that stunt would have detonated on the spot.