"ROAR!!!"
The colossal demon's bellow tore through the sky, a physical wave of sound that forced the people scattering at its feet to clutch their ears in agony.
Members of the Dark Guild, who had been fleeing in disarray, were scared out of their wits, tripping over themselves in their panic to get away.
Their plan had been to unleash chaos with Lullaby, but they never imagined its true form would be such a nightmarish, towering fiend!
In the distance, Natsu, locked in fierce combat with Erigor, immediately sensed the eruption of terrifying magical energy.
Erigor's eyes darted toward the swirling pillar of dark power, and a sinister smirk twisted his lips.
"Lullaby is running wild," he taunted, gritting his teeth. "It seems your little friends are doomed."
Natsu cast only the briefest glance toward the distant commotion before snapping his blazing gaze back to his opponent.
His concern was fleeting, replaced by pure, burning focus.
"There's no need to worry about that thing over there!"
With a fierce grunt, Natsu raised his arms, his muscles coiling and bulging with power as he ripped his tattered shirt clean off.
Instantly, scorching flames erupted across his entire body, wreathing him in an aura of intense heat.
He dropped into a ready stance, a wild, challenging grin spreading across his face as he beckoned to Erigor.
"Before Ankh turns that oversized nuisance to scrap, I'm gonna roast you first, you gloomy windbag!"
Erigor's face darkened with fury. "Arrogant brat!"
Whirlwinds shrieked to life around him, lifting him off the ground and propelling him toward Natsu like a hurricane.
"Fire can never defeat wind—that is an absolute law! Prepare to die, Fire Dragon fool!"
Natsu's sharp eyebrows shot up in defiance.
He swung his fiery fists forward, the air itself sizzling.
"Screw your laws!" he roared back, his voice full of furious pride. "My flames were taught to me by Igneel!"
As Erigor and Natsu's explosive duel raged on, Ankh had, at last, found his own source of entertainment in this mission.
Erza, standing firm nearby, looked up at the monstrous demon, her expression turn serious.
"This creature's magical energy is extraordinary," she cautioned, her hand resting on the hilt of a requip sword.
"Do not let your guard down."
Ankh gave a slight, acknowledging nod.
Then, without a word, he spread his arms wide.
The space above him shimmered and warped as a colossal, intricately designed magic circle materialized in the air.
It glowed with a steady, formidable light, illuminating the entire battlefield and casting long, stark shadows.
The Lullaby demon's eerie, glowing eyes flickered, momentarily dimming as it regarded the enormous sigil with something akin to panic.
'How can a mere human command such terrifying magical power?' it thought, a sliver of primal fear cutting through its rage.
While most demons wielded curses, Lullaby was different.
It had been sealed long ago, its very essence studied and its powers bastardized into human Magic.
It knew magical energy, and what it sensed from Ankh was profoundly, dangerously vast.
Shaking off its hesitation, the demon hardened its resolve.
No matter how strong this human seemed, a weak mortal body could never truly withstand a demon's might!
With another ground-shaking roar, it drew back a gargantuan fist and hurled it toward the floating mage.
Ankh, suspended calmly in the air before the giant magic circle, didn't even flinch.
He supported the massive structure with his hands, a low incantation leaving his lips.
"Journey to Hell."
The demon's fist never reached its target.
Before it could feel even a hint of satisfaction, an overwhelming, crushing force descended from the magic circle.
It was the immense, gravitational power of Titan Magic.
The very air seemed to solidify and press down with the weight of a mountain.
CRRRACK-BOOM!
Lullaby was mercilessly hammered into the earth by the sudden, irresistible Titan Gravity.
The ground beneath it didn't just crack; it shattered completely, collapsing inward to form a vast, pitch-black pit that plunged deep into the darkness below.
The demon vanished into the abyss, its roars of protest swallowed by the depths.
From a safer distance, Lucy stared, her jaw agape, at the newly formed chasm.
It was so deep its bottom was invisible, a void of pure black.
"H-he… he smashed a hole straight to the underworld!" she stammered, her whole body trembling. "I can't even see it anymore!"
Gray, standing beside her with his arms crossed, watched with a narrowed, analytical gaze.
"So far," he said, his voice low and serious, "the number of people I know who could crawl back out after Ankh uses that move can be counted on one hand."
Lucy's expression crumbled slightly.
"This… this kind of power," she whispered, awe and fear mingling in her voice. "Can a human really wield something like that?"
High above the pit, Ankh peered down into the darkness, his brow slightly furrowed.
Without hesitation, he dove straight down into the abyss after his prey.
Deep below, the demon Lullaby was writhing, its massive form straining against the relentless gravitational force that pinned it.
It roared in fury and frustration, clawing at the crumbling earth walls, but the light of the surface seemed impossibly far away.
It couldn't rise an inch.
Before this despair could fully set in, a figure shot down from above like a meteor.
Ankh's fists, now wrapped in the same crushing aura of Titan Gravity magic, slammed into the demon in a furious, precise combo.
Each blow landed with a sickening, resonant thud that traveled through the demon's form.
Under the interference of the gravity magic, the demon's legendary resilience was nullified.
It couldn't brace itself or generate any meaningful recoil against the attacks.
Instead, Ankh's punches became more controlled and devastating, his terrifying strength bypassing its tough hide to vibrate and shatter its internal structure.
Shocked and in pain, Lullaby gathered the dark, corrosive energy that was its signature—the Death Wave—within its gullet, aiming to blast this relentless pest into nothingness.
But Ankh was no fool.
Anticipating the move, he darted forward with blinding speed, positioning himself directly in front of the demon's massive forehead.
The aura around him shifted dramatically.
The heavy, oppressive gravity magic receded, replaced by a chilling, devouring emptiness.
Ankh's eyes snapped open.
Dark, vortex-like energy—the power of the Death Wave—swirled around him, drawn from the environment and his own immense reserves.
Dense magical power flowed into his mouth like a rushing black river, condensing into a sphere of absolute negation.
"Death God's Roar."
It was a breath attack, similar to the demon's, but Ankh's version was executed with flawless, terrifying speed.
At point-blank range, the blast erupted in the blink of an eye.
The terrifying, corrosive, and devouring magical power exploded directly on the demon's face.
The force of the impact was catastrophic.
The notorious Lullaby, caught mid-preparation, was blasted backwards, its head snapping back as it tumbled once more into the deeper darkness of the pit.
Ankh hovered in the gloom, looking down at the struggling colossal creature with icy dispassion.
"This ends now, trash," he stated, his voice echoing coldly in the subterranean chamber.
He raised a hand, and a different, more sinister magic began to weave itself through the oppressive air of the pit.
"God Slayer Magic: Meditation Song – Deathly Stillness."
As Ankh softly chanted the final words, an eerie, silent power permeated the chasm.
Even a being of pure malice like Lullaby felt the true, cold touch of death approaching.
It was a sensation of life force being siphoned away, siphoned into silence.
A circular magic circle, etched with ancient and ominous runes, glowed to life beneath the demon.
These strange symbols of death then crawled from the circle, spreading like ethereal chains over Lullaby's massive body, covering it in a dense, glowing network.
Then, silence.
An utter, profound silence fell upon the abyss.
Ankh watched, unmoving, as the magic took effect.
The scene was bizarre and unsettling. The runes merged into the demon's form and began triggering—not with loud booms, but with violent, internal convulsions.
Sections of the demon's body contorted and ruptured in a series of intense, continuous explosions that tore it apart from the inside out.
Yet, not a single sound of these detonations escaped.
It was a spectacle of brutal destruction presented in utter quiet.
Just like that, swallowed by the silence, Lullaby was utterly and inexplicably blown to pieces.
Unlike the original course of events, it never had the chance to revert to its dormant flute form for the Magic Council to collect.
It was completely and permanently annihilated by Ankh's hands.
Ankh gazed at the dissolving wreckage, slowly exhaling a long, turbid breath.
The cleanup was over.
But as he prepared to leave, a strange realization struck him.
This battle had been meant as a simple test, yet something unexpected had occurred: he had smoothly, fully devoured and integrated the demon's unique Death Wave energy.
Wiping a trace of residual dark energy from the corner of his mouth, Ankh's eyes narrowed in thoughtful contemplation.
A past mystery resurfaced in his mind.
"It seems…" he murmured to himself, the words barely audible in the silent pit, "…that demon, Seilah, wasn't completely destroyed back then."
After his battle with Seilah years ago, following her apparent defeat, Ankh had only managed to absorb faint, residual traces of her Death Wave—nowhere near the amount that should have corresponded to a demon of her caliber.
In all the intervening years, there had been no sign of her activity, and without a stronger trace to follow, Ankh had been unable to locate her.
This lingering uncertainty, this loose end in the form of a potentially surviving demon, was precisely one of the key reasons Ankh was so intent on bringing Ultear under his control.
With her knowledge and her deep connections to the underworld of Dark Guilds and forbidden histories, he would gain the insight needed to track down truths that had long eluded him, and tie up dangerous threads from the past.
---------
Read 40 chapters ahead and support me on patreon.
patreon (.)com/Newbietranslator