Chapter 42: Grab a can cannon and a living squid

Rias screamed, but the foul black liquid that filled her lungs and mouth let no voice come out of her.

"Rghl…" A growly moan came out of Akeno's gaping chest as the girl swam towards Rias, her body seemingly spitting in half and sprouting teeth-covered tentacles from her exposed internal organs.

Rias's body jerked to the side as she dodged a flailing limb filled with smaller, human-like limbs, only for them to catch her hair and drag her deeper into the inky darkness and away from Akeno's mutated form.

The inky water in front of Rias's mouth quivered as she tried to scream her lungs out upon seeing a pair of eyes open in front of her, followed by hundreds and hundreds of similar red, football-sized ocular organs. Bioluminescent red glow illuminated a dragon-like creature that seemed to fill the ink-covered hollow.

Rias tried to pry the tentacle off her waist, but failed as her hands had turned jelly-like as if they had suddenly lost their bones and just flailed like tentacles, tying themselves around each other like noodles in a pot.

The [Power of Destruction] never came to her as she tried to manifest her powers, leaving her cold and helpless in the ice-cold ink as visions of what lies beyond dark bombarded her soul.

The silent screams never stopped.

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Akeno felt as if her heart would burst as she swam towards a red-headed figure through a void that seemed to resist her swimming attempts, with each draw floating her further and further away from Rias's face which had turned deathly pale and had sprouted black inky veins. The red-head's body was twisting itself unnaturally like if she was made of boiling water that constantly burst and re-made itself.

Akeno screamed as she felt the inky darkness grant her wish, turning her arms to huge fish-like fins starting from her shoulders while her mouth opened to gross size, fitting a pair of gills under her jaw.

The 'girl's body twitched as the body horror continued, granting her wish for tools for reaching Rias and at the same time making her unable to truly reach her as Rias's bubbling form was dragged away by a inky-black tentacle, and no matter how fast Akeno swam, she could never reach her.

.

Yuuto kept cutting.

Cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting…

Every single cut he made caused a tentacle to split in two, but each tentacle split turned to two separate tentacles, multiplying without number.

But he had to keep the appendages away. He had already lost both of his legs to the things, as the thing's heads had opened to show a tube full of sharp, eel-like teeth and suck his jelly-like legs into them.

He swung his blade at one more tentacle, only to realize that his sword was a tentacle as well.

As were his fingers.

He cut his own hands off.

The tentacles reached him, and sucked away his liquified stomach and the organs within like a vacuum cleaner.

Yuuto kept screaming.

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Souji Okita kept cutting.

Cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting, cutting…

Each blow he struck was returned in kind, blocking each other, and the frog-like swamp monster he dueled screamed shockwaves into the black ink with each blow it parried.

Souji had cut its legs, but it hadn't even twitched. When it was distracted by its own hands, he struck again, cutting its stomach open.

The sack of organs exploded, showering the inky, lightless depths the Samurai and his opponent had been sunken into with eels and worms that burst from the bloated stomach.

The faint light coming from the blade striking at the parasites illuminated countless black, pincer-like jaws followed by bloated, pus-filled worm-bodies.

Souji flinched instinctively, which was enough to allow the writhing wall of worms to come an inch closer, until he felt one bit his neck, followed by another, and another, and another…

The inky dark turned tumultuous as countless worms bit through skin and invaded Souji Okita's body.

Souji screamed.

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Asia screamed as an undead face was within inches of hers, and she was stuck in its cold, dead embrace.

Her body had merged halfway into the creature's chest, and she tried to swat her hands at the creature's head to keep it from devouring the rest of her. The Death Knight didn't flinch, and merely raised its tower shield to block a streak of light from hitting Asia's head which had turned oddly jelly-like, as if she was a strand of seaweed stuck in a current. And the strand was getting slurped down by a hungry undead fish.

Asia felt her arms wobble around, feeling incredibly useless as her [Twilight Healing] failed to restore her rapidly mutating state…

.

Xenovia begged for God to save her, yet no pain came, and no salvation came either. She knew she was beyond His reach. The Deep was out of His realm. No light would ever shine to it, only the light brought within would illuminate what horrors lied within.

Irina, however, was resolute even in the face of dark… but not when the dark had exploded with tentacles, all with various violent ends. Indeed, the two exorcists were fighting against a mass of dark, the light of Excaliburs seeming dull and muted in face of the depths.

Xenovia swung her [Excalibur Rapidly] at the black mass, and it rose to intercept her blow, revealing a visage of Asia, her form faded and violated, getting sucked into undead carcass like a reverse c-section.

Xenovia vomited into the dark, ink-like water, as did Irina.

And the two screamed as they realized their fates when the distraction allowed the dark masses around them reveal their true forms, and the Death Knights covered them as well...

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Koneko shivered.

Cocoon of light shielded her from all harm, the dome having formed around her small body which had curled into fetal position.

She didn't want to do it, she didn't want to use it, she wasn't good at it, she hadn't intended to use it, she would just hurt everyone…

The dome shimmered and Koneko shrunk to herself further as the dome created by Senjutsu flickered, allowing the dark creatures outside to sink their teeth closer to her body.

The dark screamed to let them in, and Koneko hugged her legs closer to her than ever, feeling her knees fuse together with her chest.

Her eyes sprang open as she began fusing with herself, the ball of light becoming ever smaller and smaller upon her fear of getting caught, of her getting noticed by the things outside realized.

She screamed in fear as the disembodied faces, appendages and limbs pierced the dome and the dark shapes merged with her now-glowing body, letting hisses of burning flesh.

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Yubelluna screamed as she swam to one direction, and Xuelan tried to swim to another.

The two moved to neither direction, however, as the two had fused at the hip, with one's torso where other's legs should have been.

Indeed, the two had been close, but the deep had made them closer, inseparable… Too much so. Yubelluna had long since realized that the ink was a monkey's paw, wish upon it and be damned. Xuelan, however, had panicked.

The dome of light promised safety, but they were blocked, stopped by the invisible field.

Yubelluna knew that the dome was a lie, a lure, a bioluminescent glow in the deep dark they were entombed within, and to stray close would only provoke the prey-fish that waited beneath. Xuelan, however, wished for safety, the Rook facing an enemy that was beyond either of their comprehension- one what couldn't be struck, or bombed, or hurt. Nor survived.

Yubelluna felt her fear realized as her fear was given form, with Xuelan reaching the light-dome, causing a maw of razor-sharp teeth to form around them and clamp down.

She screamed shockwaves of black ink into the not-water as the light faded, and the rows and rows of teeth ate at her mind.

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The dark void merged with another, one deep black and with an aura as old as the stars, and other young and full of madness and fire.

Dragonic maw bit down on a squid-like body, its teeth turning to writhing tentacles upon touching the creature's slimy coating, obscured from view by its maddening ink.

What madness the ink created was returned in kind as tentacles turned to greatswords that pierced the creature's outer shell, causing it to let a shriek. Or rather, it caused the thing biting it to let a shriek of kind, penetrating the veil of black as the roles of the two reversed in a blink and the squid swam away after biting the dragon's neck with beak-like maw extending from it's eye-socket.

The squid tried to swim through the ink, letting a gust of dark black at its wake and caused the dark dragon to open its mouth wide enough to split its jaws, its long neck, and ending the maw-opening to near its shoulders, opening his neck and throat to expose a long row of human-like teeth that reached for the squid's tentacles and bit one off.

The dragon let a scream as its neck elongated to resemble a tentacle, absorbing a shard of the creature's power and causing thousands of tiny eyes to start lining its rows of scales, as it comprehended the slightest sliver if the being, knowledge floodings the dark dragon's 'existence' until the absorption came to and end with a image of a skeletal figure clad in sea of deep violet.

The dragon let another scream as the squid enveloped its chest, biting into its heart with its beak.

Only, the two swapped places and the dragon bit deeper into the creature's 'heart'.

The physical dance of consumption was merely a pretense as the dragon's madness caused the ink that surrounded them to turn venomous around the squid, simple-minded desire flooding the deep dark of knowledge from time beyond time, the powers of both creatures stopping and starting the flow of time around them as if it was a pair of light-switches on two ends of a hallway being flipped by two petulant children.

The squid let a groan as the dragon's work caused it the eldric creature's equivalent of a headache, which extended to a head-splitting migraine upon the dragon latching onto the creature's pain and annoyance like a hungry fly finding a rotting carcass.

The 'battle' turned as the squid's equivalent of cold logic turned to its equivalent of annoyance and fury, which robbed it of its 'weapon's, giving them to the creature of madness that drank deep from the creature's degrading state.

The squid realized too late that it was consuming itself as it coiled harder and harder around the dragon, and their positions switched for one last time as the squid consumed itself.

The crevice of the deep dark it called its home in a vast sea of forbidden void imploded on itself and was reborn to reveal the malformed, dark dragon which had taken its place.

The dragon opened its maw wide, inhaling the dark and the creatures struggling within the ink around it.

The bubble of darkness burst.

.

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In a place beyond knowling a massive tentacle twitched as the sleeping Dreamer felt one of its children-yet-not perish. It did not wake, however, but the twitch was enough to set a series of events in motion, for the Great One did nothing without purpose.

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The swamp burst with ink as the lake the eldric squid-creature had consumed exploded outwards, vomiting its contents upon the Underworld.

Belial retreated to avoid getting splashed by the rain of quickly evaporating black maggots and equally dark leeches that burst upon touching the foul swamp-water, the beings of reality and Depths cancelling each other out and eating one another upon touching.

The upper half of a dark dragon-like thing extended itself upright from the lake of unnerving deep black 'water', complete with tentacles thicker than a man sprouting from both the deep water and from the dragon itself.

The dragon opened its mouth, extended the unnaturally wide maw to its shoulders and vomited a group of people to the foul swamp, before swinging its massive bat-wings open and dragging itself completely off the black lake.

The full creature was revealed, showing that its lower half was composed of a malformed blob of tentacles, teeth and eyes that looked dull and dead.

The eyes blinked, and every single of the creature's hundreds of eyes suddenly turned to stare directly at Belial, causing the man to take a step back before he could stop himself- the creature's stare felt like it would pierce straight through to his mind and scramble it like chainsaw would scramble an egg and the chicken the egg had been inside of.

The Creature then locked its eyes to a black-hooded skeletal figure in the lake, who placed a wooden stick it had been using like a staff against the swamp-water.

"That… is… incredible!" Belial felt elated as the boring day-to-day grind of the Champion turned to something straight out of a horror novel. He was less elated by his current opponent, however, as he would have loved to test his mettle with an eldritch being.

Fate, however, had other plans and had pitted Belial against an annoying undead spell-caster.

The skeletal creature that had once been 'Riser Phenix' let go of the stick it had held, which stayed upright on top of the water.

And the skeleton clapped its bony hands together.

"Marvelous… Simply marvelous! Her potential, her capability… Ahaha! Truly, for Himto plan our every single move to this extent… Did he see my summoning in advance, or did he react on the fly?" The skeleton began sprouting nonsense once again. "From fight pairings, to distraction of powerful foes, to laying down such meticulous traps and distractions… He is truly the Supreme Being!"

"Getting real tired of your bullshit, Riser." Belial growled the skeleton before charging at it again, growing more and more angry with his mounting realization that he couldn't get proper grasp on the wayward Phenix corpse's magical powers.

He had tried using his [Worthless]ness on Riser's devil powers, but nothing had happened. Same with Riser's teleportation circles, yet the teleportation had happened regardless.

Indeed, even as Belial charged at the skeleton, it teleported out of the way and appeared on the other side of the waist-deep swamp- lake, placing the dark dragon between it and Belial.

Belial had gotten few good hits into the skeletal creature initially, but it seemed that while he had gotten more and more confused over the skeleton's abilities as he looked for chances to use his [Worthless], the skeleton had learned from Belial's abilities and adjusted its strategies accordingly- Summoning undead creatures to hinder Belial's superior mobility and teleporting away whenever he got too close, and combining hindering spells with damage-dealing to the point Belial was hard-pressed to turn to offense.

Belial was, after all, specialized in close-range combat

Not to mention that he was forced to also keep an eye on Lady Phenix who had gone to a unresponsive state upon seeing her 'son' 'ascend', as it had called itself, or rather shed its human skin and turn truly skeletal- revealing a crooked, inhuman skull that couldn't have belonged to a devil or a human.

The woman was incapable of defending herself in her shock, so Belial had to ensure her safety as well as his own.

"What a fascinating thing..." The skeleton seemed to take a mental note of the malformed draconic creature before turning back towards Belial. "This 'battle' has been most entertaining, Belial, correct? However, I find it curious that my Master is so worried over your ability, which is quite powerful, but thoroughly wasted on you… After all, calling your deduction capabilities lower than that of a dog unable to find its own tail would be a gross insult to the dog."

Belial growled at skeletal Riser's insult.

"Or perhaps He intended me to acquire your… Ability? Hm, quite… It would serve me better than it would ever serve you. I'll have to clarify that, however, but I'll better secure your body just in case." The skeleton tilted its head and addressed the next words to Belial. "I'll need your body and soul, Belial. Hold still."

Belial dodged as the skeleton lifted its hand.

"[Call Thunder]" The skeleton incanted, and a massive thunderstrike came from the tumultuous sky to strike at Belial, missing, but still electrocuting him as the discharge spread through the dirty water and struck his leg. "[Grand Fireball]"

Belial didn't manage to dodge the huge fireball as his leg spasmed out, and the fireball knocked him off his feet and he dipped under the swamp-water.

A skeleton rose from the water to try to drown Belial, and he elbowed the fragile thing into powder but was grabbed by three more skeletons and heavier, Knight-like undead Yuuto Kiba had dubbed 'Death Knight', which was wielding a halberd-like polearm that it used to push Belial's head below the water as he lifted himself up.

"ENOUGH!" Belial screamed in anger, crushing the smaller undead and grabbing the heft of the polearm, pulling it off the Death Knight's hands and hitting the undead creature with its own weapon.

The Death Knight let out a groan as it pulled a new halberd from thin air and the one in Belial's hands disappeared into motes of energy.

Skeletal Riser had not been idle during the distraction, however, and teleported next to Belial.

Belial turned to punch the skeleton in the face, managing to land a hit on its face but it also touched Belial's chest at the same time, as Belial had instinctively hesitated for the briefest moment when the skeletal form's Aura of instinctive, animalistic dread had hit him.

"[Paralyze]" The skeleton was flung off, but its spell still activated and caused Belial to freeze still- and then collapse forward as the Death Knight behind him drove its halberd through his back and out of his stomach.

"GRAAAAH!" Belial channeled his rage to pull the Death Knight closer to himself by grabbing the heft of the polearm and ripping it forward, causing the undead behind him to impact his back as the weapon it held was yanked.

He then elbowed its face, causing the Death Knight's face to explode, and after its grip twitched open, turned around to punch its chest into a deep imploded crater that finished it off.

Belial coughed blood as the Death Knight and its weapon stuck to his stomach disappeared.

Before Skeleton-Riser could continue its attacks Belial created a rack of steel spears with [Power of Imagination] and threw them at the skeleton that merely allowed the spears to pierce itself, the weapons passing through without causing more than nicks on its bones.

"Using piercing damage agai- aha! Indeed, gloating against such a foe is truly dangerous... Thank you, my Master. My arrogance has been my downfall almost twice now. Thank you for allowing me this learning opportunity." The skeleton seemed to speak to the sky as it turned its head up, almost as if it was praying. "Now, let us resume, Belial. [Call- hm?"

The skeleton dodged a wild swing from one of the wildly-swinging tentacles belonging to the massive creature in the middle of the swamp-turned-battlefield and teleported away once again as the malformed creature turned its attacks towards the skeleton.

'Hm? They're not on the same side?' Belial was more than little confused over the shifting loyalties, but pressed on, turning to other attacks.

After all, the undead had let slip a crucial detail- 'piercing' damage wouldn't work, so by using power of deduction, one could assume that blunt damage would crush bones the best.

Belial used [Power of Imagination] to craft himself a chain of metal balls to throw at the undead creature like bolas, and charged at the skeletal figure that seemed quite surprised by the attacks the blob of darkness was throwing at it while it dodged Belial's thrown metal balls before they could crush its bones.

Lady Phenix finally broke the stupor from seeing the malformed dragon join the fray, or rather felt the soul-chilling aura it gave off, and joined Belial's charge with a scream of rage of her own.

Before either of them could get to the undead though, a wedge of the three remaining cavalry-knights charged out behind the skeletal Riser, riding past it and impacting against Belial and Lady Phenix, causing their charge to come to a stumble as they faced the undead and knocked two of the cavalry-Knights to the ground, finishing them off while the third rode off.

However, the delay allowed a wall of flamberge-and-shield wielding Death Knights to rise from the dark puddle underneath the mass of writhing limbs and draconic torso, forming a wall of shields between the wayward skeletal Phoenix son and Belial and Lady Phenix.

"Ah, my master's fellow servants... I've dilly-dallied too long. It seems my time is up, and it is time for us to part." The skeleton seemed to figure out something. "It has truly been a pleasure, Belial-san. I look forward to having you on my vivisection table… Oh?" The skeleton pulled out a scroll, but before Belial could renew his already expired [Worthless] on the ability, the skeleton put the scroll back to a burlap bag it had relocated on its waist after its floating cloth around it had disappeared. "True, [Scroll of Gate] wouldn't work with your [Worthless] applied to it, but… Ah, as expected of Him. A way out arrives just in time."

Belial charged the wall of Death Knights with Lady Phenix in tow as a shimmering rift seemed to open near the skeleton, intending on breaking through the line of shields and getting to the skeleton before it could escape.

However, a small, petite and emotionless black-haired girl walked from the portal.

"Ophis... " Belial ground out as he recognized the lethargic Infinite Ouroboros Dragon took. He had never met the fabled dragon in person, but the Aura it gave was unmistakable- it was as if everything came to an entropic standstill around her.

"I, I want you. You're strong. I've watched. Help me kill baka-Red." The Ouroboros dragon pointed at the skeletal Riser, her expression utterly unchanging. "I, I'll save you from getting killed, so you help me kill baka-Red. I, I'll make you stronger with a snake. I, I think this is a good deal. Take it."

"Of course, of course…" The skeleton nodded its head as it walked past Ophis and into her portal without giving her more than half a glance, causing the black-haired girl to turn around and look at the skeleton's back. "Truly, my Master sees all… Come, my fellow puppet, our master beckons us to another stage of this grand play..."

Belial dodged a swing from one of the Death Knights and stepped inside its shield's cover, hitting the undead creature once in the head to make its brain-box explode and then finishing it off with a blunt strike with elbow against its chest to make the undead creature crumble into motes of darkness. He had to pause to hold his stomach immediately afterwards though, as the stomach wound reminded of its existence and forced Belial to reconsider the wiseness of high-intensity moves while he was running the risk of expelling his guts through the wound.

He managed to glance at the Ouroboros Dragon before it walked back into the portal after the skeleton-Riser, and Belial did a double-take that allowed a Death Knight nearby to almost drive its sword into Belial's back.

The normally-emotionless Infinite Ouroboros Dragon's face was thoroughly, utterly confused.

A tentacle of massive proportions swat the swinging Death Knight before it could pierce the confused Champion, throwing the undead knight up in the air and the malformed dragon grabbed the undead with its unnaturally wide jaws.

It bit down a few times on the skeleton before swallowing the darkness that remained of the now-dead Knight, turning towards the remaining undead in a ravenous feeding frenzy.

Belial and Lady Phenix looked at each other, counted the remaining undead, and bolted towards the group of people slowly rising from the black ink after the dragon had regurgitated them.

Most of them were screaming,swinging their arms or weapons at nonexistent enemies, or floating unresponsively on top of the now-buoyant ink-water.

Rias was screaming while tearing at her own eyes, Akeno was coughing up black ink while trying to flap her arms like a fish, while the other members of Momon's Peerage were in various different stages of insanity or unresponsiveness.

The sole remaining cavalry-Knight charged, intending on delaying Lady Phenix, but was cut down to hundreds of little pieces in an instant as it entered Souji Okita's attack range, the man having shivered himself upright from the inky water, looking incredibly shaken.

"G-ghet, ugh- the- damn, maggots, everywhere, get away!" Souji's eyes were wide and wild, and Belial had to stop and catch the man's blade as it swung towards his head as well. A feat that he was able to perform only because of his reflexes and high specialization of melee combat, and because Souji was clearly attacking something other than Belial, even if his swing had been directed at the Champion.

The blade left two clear cuts to Belial's hands as it withdrew, making Belial conclude that whatever had happened in the inky depths had driven Sirzechs Lucifer's Knight insane.

Belial managed to avoid six more similar lightning-fast strikes before he managed to close in, a distraction mud-toss forcing the swordsman to strike at the glob of mud and scream as the blob was cut but impacted his face nonetheless.

Belial's fist followed the glob of mud into Souji's face, knocking the Samurai back into the muddy, gross swamp-water.

"Gurh!" Souji coughed out foul water after inhaling a lung-full off the foul stuff, exhaling the water alongside some residue ink. "What- what the hell! What the actual hell! What was that? How was that?"

"Snap back to reality!" Belial slapped Souji, causing the man to vomit the contents of his stomach out and revealing countless little maggots that sizzled out upon touching the foul swamp-water.

Belial did a double-take on the man's condition, but it seemed that Souji was recovering at fairly impressive speed even if he was incredibly disoriented and shaky. "Souji Okita! You're in the Underworld, get yourself together or we're leaving you behind!"

Souji seemed to gather himself at the words, cruel as they might have been, but it was disgraceful for Maou's Peerage to show such weakness at such a crucial time.

"A- Argh, you're a right ass, aren't you, Diehauser Belial?" Souji seemed to focus his eyes on Belial for the first time since appearing from the dark ink. "Take a dive into the stuff and talk tough to me afterwards!"

"Stop pounding your chests and help me!" Lady Phenix screamed at the two men as she poured a vial of Phoenix Tears on top of unresponsive Yuuto Kiba, who floated nearby with his stomach cut open and missing both of his legs and hands. "We need to get everyone together and get away before that thing eats all of the undead and focuses on us!"

Unfortunately, it looked they were out of time as the draconic mass of darkness ate the last Death Knight as the words lef Lady Phenix's mouth, and the creature's hundreds of eyes focused solely on the woman. And then turned to look at Rias who was tearing deep gashes to her own face with her nails.

The mass of darkness collapsed, flooding the entire clearing with energy that caused the few still-standing trees in the now-hundreds of feet wide battlefield to turn crooked and corrupt, while the Peerage members paled and struggled to breathe as their very lives felt like being snuffed out.

Lady Phenix raised a shield of fire to illuminate the group and protect them from the flood of negative energy, but was only capable of doing so much before it broke and allowed the darkness in.

Belial shielded himself as the wave of energy passed, and lowered his hand as the wave came to an end.

He did a quick head-count of the people present, and found to his disappointment that the wave of energy had managed to finish off the last security-devil, the woman Belial had ear-marked, and who had survived the trip to the deep ink, but hadn't survived the wave of negative energy.

On the other hand, something else had survived it, if some only barely.

Belial turned his eyes away from a sight of a vaguely human-like form floating on top of the foul water where the mass of darkness had been, and turned his eyes towards the muscle-bound giant that had woken up from the wave of negative energy.

"GUHHHHOOOO" A muted, insane boom of a voice came from Lord Phenix-golem's mouth as it charged the barely-recovering devils, its flesh turned black and rotting but its body still holding stronger than ever.

Belial was in no mood for playing, so he threw his remaining anti-undead metal balls at it, hitting two at its knees and intending on following with more… but the crooked trees that had been felled around the swamp seemed to come alive, standing up on their uprooted roots and entwining their branches upon Lord Phenix-golem's body and sucking the undead body, ironically much like how roots would suck at nutrients.

Belial didn't look a gift horse in the mouth as he wobbled at the constrained regenerating flesh-golem, wobbling being the keyword as his stomach-wound was starting to hinder him quite a bit.

Souji stepped in front of Belial, however.

"You're wounded, leave this to me." Souji said, pulling his katana from its sheath, dashing forwards and stabbing it at the now-prostrating flesh-golem's side.

The samurai then slid the blade from one side to another, and pulled the blade to perform a decapitating move in perfect forced harakiri form.

Lord Phenix's head fell from his shoulders and floated on top of the foul water, all the while the corrupted trees crawled their vines and roots on top of the still-regenerating body that soon became a bed of growth for the trees.

"I'll have to ask Sirzechs to pencil in a fire-bombing on this swamp sometime soon…" Souji shook his blade, feeling the familiarity of it nibble away at the mass of dark fear that had been imbued inside his very soul in his brief visit to the Deep.

"Ah…" Lady Phenix walked away from the recovering, insane or unconscious devils towards the floating object, and lifted Lord Phenix's tortured, decapitated head from the water. "Ah…"

"AAAAAHHHH!" The woman's painful, sorrowful scream echoed in the swamp.

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Momonga felt that something was happening as the invisible threads belonging to his Death Knights were severed in quick succession, as well as the ones belonging to his Death Cavaliers. 'Oh? Well, I expected them to die, so it's not a great surprise that they did… Still, Death Knights usually don't die easily so whoever killed them must have a high attack-rate… Cavaliers did as well as I imagined they would, they aren't particularly outstanding in any role outside breaking tight formations...'

He considered creating a scouting undead by using [Create Undead: First] to make a Corpse Carrion and using [Undead Slave Sight] on it to get a better overview of the situation, but decided against it as Sirzechs was looking towards a direction like a hawk. The same direction in which the Death Knights had been destroyed.

The Crow created by [Lead of Yatagarasu] let a caw on Momonga's shoulder and hopped off, flying to perch on a branch nearby.

"Is there a problem?" Momonga asked as he changed Ravel's position from princess carry to more appropriate sack-on-shoulder carry as the girl kept struggling.

"Nothing, I just felt… Something happen." Sirzechs shook his head. "Listen, Momon-kun, can I trust you to keep Ravel safe and guarded for a few minutes? I need to go check out something. Do not leave her alone, or leave her immediate vicinity."

"Sure, go right ahead." Momonga took the chance Sirzechs offered and placed Ravel on a relatively dry spot next to a tree.

The two were just outside the now-imploded base that had belonged to Momonga's Elder Lich. Sirzechs had been relaying orders to his subordinates through phone, but hadn't been able to contact one of his Peerage, apparently, and had used some sigils to get situation reports from someone who Momonga had assumed to be Beelzebub.

Apparently there was something about Fallen Angels, Devils, and some other buzzwords that made it sound as if a war was being fought. Momonga had been quite curious but had decided against trying to pull information from Sirzechs, as poking the sleeping raid boss seemed to be a bad move no matter how the conversation would go.

He figured he could ask the 'maids' in his mansion through [Message] at some point if he needed, and he assumed the maids would contact him in turn should something happen.

'Now that I think about it, could they contact me if they had been all engaged at the same time? [Message] can be used in combat, technically, but it makes it seriously easy to land a cheap shot on anyone writing or sending a message…' Momonga started to get a bit worried, but shook his head as Sirzechs materialized a pair of bat-wings and took off, launching a few black javelin-like projectiles on his way to destroy presumably enemies. The reason became clear as something seemed to shoot at the airborne Maou with a bow, missing, and the Maou returned fire before disappearing beyond the treeline.

'Well, that's out of my hair…' Momonga turned towards Ravel, whose eyes opened wide and her struggling against the binds Sirzechs had created ceased.

It looked like she was trying to make herself as small as possible to hide from Momonga's sight, but as it failed, she tried to form a magical circle in front of her to launch fireball from.

While the spell succeeded, the lack of proper aim thanks to her bound condition meant that it went completely wild, setting a nearby tree on fire.

"You know, attacking me won't make things any easier for you, young lady." Momonga child Ravel whose cheeks turned red from anger. 'Right, what should I do with her…'

Momonga had been initially worried, panicked even when Ravel had blown his cover, calling him "Supreme Being" in front of Sirzechs. However, before he had managed to grab her head and cast [Control Amnesia] on her Sirzechs had turned around and intervened.

Momonga thanked his Emotion Suppression for what must have been a thousandth time in that day alone as it had allowed him to remain calm enough to think rationally, and ignore his first instinct of casting [Undead Army] and then [Grasp Heart] on Sirzechs upon his cover blowing.

Fortunately, however, he managed to hold back the gut reaction and it seemed that the risky gamble paid off- Sirzechs had assumed that Ravel was confused and dazed, which had been even more reinforced as Ravel had likely concluded that Sirzechs was working with 'Momon', who was 'Supreme Being', and voiced as much. Her accusations hadn't drawn sympathy from either of the accused.

'...Technically, she's correct on both aspects, but seeing Sirzech's reaction… Yes, I can use Ravel as a Mockingbird.' Suzuki Satoru thought, remembering Neo-Japan.

Indeed, in Neo-Japan Mockingbird technique had been a state-favorite way of discouraging and disintevizing ideas and teachings deemed unsuitable by the ruling corporations- stuff such as unions, six-day workweeks as opposed to seven-day workweeks, and safe workplaces etcetra. The strategy was simple- Set up a loud, opinionated mouthpiece that would be heard by majority of the public, and which would pretend to be part of the idea that was being suppressed, but displayed in such comedically disproportionated way that the very notion of the idea became ridiculed- even if it could have been very useful for its target audience, if properly realized.

Indeed, the 'Union' Mockingbird mouthpieces would act lazy, expensive and overly cautious to the point of excessive to cause general public to assume the very notion of 'Unions' would equate to 'lazy, expensive and scared workers' instead of being a group aiming to amend the truly dystopian working conditions of Neo-Japan.

'...If I can get Ravel to spout a bunch of exaggerated nonsense about me being "Supreme Being", then I can desensitize everyone to the idea and even if the secret comes out, it won't be believed as truth…' Momonga schemed, causing Ravel to freeze utterly still as he looked at the girl. She then tried to scream and twitch away, but failed to do both thanks to the bindings.

Momonga then glanced to the side as the girl's eyes were drawn to something beside him.

Momonga did a double-take.

The undead alligator which had floated to view did a double-take as well it stared at the destroyed base.

It seemed to look around, as confused as an undead thrall could be.

It then turned towards Momonga, and he could practically see the rusty gears clicking in the undead creature's head. It seemed to reach a conclusion, floated in front of Momonga, opened its long jaws, backed away, and floated away into the undergrowth with the enthusiasm of a warehouse worker fifteen minutes over its shift.

Momonga and Ravel stared at Sona Sitri's dead and slightly chewed body which floated on the swamp-water after the alligator had deposited it in front of Momonga like a dog being told to fetch.

'...What?'

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