Ch. 14 Squashing a fly

-Outside the capital City of Lucifaad

"First time I've ever seen that city quiet my lord." Horuth commented from beside me as we overlooked the Underworld's capital of sin.

I could understand why he's saying that too.

Living a few years in that city while all my plans were in motion left me with quite the strong image of Lucifaad being a city which never slept.

There is constantly an event or party going on, shops were divided between nightlife and daytime, casinos and bars were open 24/7, brothels always welcomed customers with open arms and legs, and devils themselves could go on for days of hedonism. And while that was only half of the city itself, it was enough to make it seem constantly abuzz.

"True, but then the ones usually making the noise are the cowards amongst us.

Those who would never fight for another or a cause, simply looking out for their own interests and drowning themselves in their sins without control.

They are the devils who let sin rule them instead of ruling their own sin.

Willing to let everything burn as long as they alone may continue living as they do." I replied with some disgust over the memories I had of these very same cowards who had abandoned the city, lording their so-called strength and power over those who made their lives possible.

"You know, I've known you for a few years my lord, but I've never been able to figure out your major sin.

I'm sure you figured out that it was my pride which kept me from ending things and allowing me to meet you. But you've never shown much in terms of sin." The old man said as this actually drew some curious looks from my top servants and combatants.

"*Chuckle* Really? Because I've always felt myself being quite…greedy." I replied which actually surprised him apparently.

"Never seen you lust for gold or profits before." Horuth shot back feeling a bit doubtful.

"Who said my greed was for money?" Was my come back, "Now get ready. You'll all be under Horuth's command for this one."

"I shall await your victorious return master." Fia dutifully said, but I could feel the tension in her body from her worry.

"Don't miss dinner you hear me master? I'm making your favorites." Liora added as she motivated me with that.

"We will finish this battle before you even come back." Heltana said as she had wanted to be by my said.

'Call for my aid and I shall come at any time.' Sigil stated as put on a strong front.

"Lomr chief is strongest! Lomr excited to see enemy chief head!" My big blue tribesman said as he really didn't doubt me.

"Your trust will not be in vain my lord." Horuth said as he saluted me.

With a nod, I vanished.

Reappearing in the famed Hall of Satans as only on Bidleid Beelzebub sat in his seat, solemnly staring at the three empty seats around him.

"It is interesting to meet you Satan Beelzebub." I said as I announced my presence.

This made him immediately tense and look at me wearily.

"Who are you and how did you get here?" He asked rather demandingly.

"My name is Lith, Lith Azaroth. And I simply walked in." I calmly answered truthfully.

And it was truthfully. I just simply walked through space to get here instead of the traditional way.

"So you're the insect I've heard about. Well, more like a sneaky rat." He derisively said as he openly scorned me.

"I would be insulted, but the words of an overgrown fly don't worry me much." I casually responded.

That seemed to have hit a nerve however since the next word he spoke was simply: "Die."

Shooting a beam of green demonic power at me, much like Tsufaame had done, just a bit stronger since he was angry at my disrespect.

I didn't even bother dodging as I phases through the attack and moved forward, using it as a cover.

Once it finished, taking out whatever had happened to be being me and creating a hole in the castle, I was right in front of the Beelzebub. Much to his surprise as I was unharmed.

"What-?" Was the only thing he got out as I decided to give him a punch using all of my bodily might and skills to see how much it would hurt a Satan-class.

At the same time I opened a portal behind him so we could take this fight elsewhere.

I tried to teleport us, but being above a certain level of power can resist my forceful teleportation and direct applications of [Space] on their bodies for now. Too bad that doesn't apply to portals however since I'm not teleporting someone, but pushing them through two areas in space in formed a shortcut to reach.

But back to the body blow.

*Crack!*

A loud crack could be heard as Beelzebub's ribs at least cracked from the punch and he was launched through the portal. I also heard the beginning of a loud pained yell as he flew away.

"Graah!"

I then stepped through the portal as well, closing it behind me.

The area had been well chosen for this fight, being the Great Lake which supported Lucifaad itself.

It was far enough from the city that nothing from our fight should reach it unless we wanted it to, while still being able to have it in sight. That last bit was important for giving the Beelzebub hope of reaching the place should he defeat me instead of ignoring me and trying to get back.

Watching the great Satan Beelzebub clutching his side while breathing heavily, soaking wet from his surprise dip in the lake was a nice sight though.

That punch actually told me a lot about my opponent too.

No physical training whatsoever. I could feel no pectoral or back muscles, with actually a bit of fat instead. No martial arts either by extension since I took his feet out from under him too easily and he didn't reduce the impact by jumping back. Lacking combat experience evident by the fact that he couldn't react to my strike, didn't believe I could dodge his, and seemed to be unable to properly handle the pain of a few ribs cracking.

What a pussy. I had to at least crack four bones every time I advanced training level with the martial arts golems in the H.A.H. Hell, I still crack some bones from time to time and that's after countless cycles of breaking and mending reinforcing them with added bonuses thanks to my demonic energy and [Space].

I'm actually pretty sure my bones could serve as top class ingredients in a space cutting sword like Yamato at this point.

Overall, Bidleid Beelzebub was perfectly in line with how traditional noble devils operate. Beside those with physically related clan traits anyway. Focusing on pure demonic power and magic to overpower their foes, never physically training or sometimes even properly training the abilities their were born with, getting by on talent alone.

To be fair, as the son of the original Beelzebub, Bidleid inherited a massive amount of power and very useful clan trait from birth, allowing him to easily overpower other nobles devils. This meant he never saw a need to train himself in any meaningful way and probably focused solely of King of Flies.

Basically, he's a more powerful version of Rias.

"I will kill you for that you mongrel!" The enraged Beelzebub said as he held his side.

'He probably wanted to shout, but unless he's got Phoenix… oh he does have some. Oh well, that's a waste. I guess he'll be able to yell insults at me now.' I thought as I watched the man take out an intricate vial and chug the contents.

He was covered in a soft glow and no longer had to hold his ribs.

'So many chances to kill him.' I inwardly complained as I watched the idiot. 'If I didn't need a durable enough punching bag to get my energy going I would have killed the idiot already.'

"You done being wasteful yet? I want to start the actual fight." I plainly said.

In response Bidleid seemed to do his best to become a Super Saiyan as he let his demonic power burst out with an enraged yell. Broly green too.

"Finally." I simply said as my own power quietly enveloped me in a dense purple aura.

This alone showcased the wide chasm our energy control skills stood across.

He did have the advantage in pure power however.

His only advantage at this point.

He then proceed to fire powerful aura beams, which I began to counter by firing focused ones into their center, resulting in both canceling each other other and his to do so with explosive flashes of green.

This was a testing phase as we traded blow after blow, trying to outmaneuver each other to land hits. I decided to go along with this in order to experience traditional biblical faction combat instead of my style of all out fighting.

But after ten minutes i felt that it wasn't enough. I wasn't using my energy enough.

So to push Bidleid into his [King of Flies], I decided to start imbuing some of my [Space] into my aura beams, which made them cut though the ones fired by Bidleid.

This sudden change took the Satan off guard as he dodged the purple beam and then looked at its source in shock, followed by anger. Probably over some kind of imagined insult to his honor or something.

That was when the man finally began to create the famous flies of Beelzebub.

*Bzzzzzzzzzzzz*

The growing cacophony of buzzes sounded out as thousands of flies formed a cloud behind the Beelzebub.

"About fucking time. I was getting bored." I murmured to myself since him pretty sure any kind of trash talk wouldn't be heard over the buzzing in my opponents ears.

What came next was an absolute barrage of smaller aura beams as his flies began to spread out, beginning the classic Beelzebub fighting style.

In response I was using my almost complete aura of [Space] to redirect the beams away from my own personal space which rejected them, while simultaneously sending slashes of condensed spatial energy. Starting an extremely high paced exchange of attacks.

Bidleid tried to simply overpower the slashes using concentrated fired, but that only managed to slow them down. In the end he had to either dodge of sacrifice a large amount of flies to take the hit for him. Most of the time choosing the latter since he could just make more and he felt like it was insulting to have to dodge his opponents attacks.

So our pure demonic power brawl continued as I could finally feel my stagnated energy flow, getting stronger and stronger as I utilized my [Space] en mass. This was causing constant explosion as Bedleid's attacks were sent away and collided with my slashes.

This brawl confirmed my theory that Satan-Class was basically the stage where your demonic power became specialized towards a devil's primary source of strength. Serafall's ice, Sirzechs' destruction, Falbium's defense, and Ajuka's control. It would be akin to how divinities on gods boosted their power when it came to their domains, explaining why Satan-classes could take them on.

I think Bidleid could feel the change as well since his attacks were becoming more intense by the minute, almost becoming desperate as I excitedly used more and more power in my slashes, leaving behind trails of cut space which hindered any beams the Beelzebub sent until they fixed themselves.

This resulted in myself losing track of time as I enjoyed the feeling of just blasting things using pure away and sending slashes around without any care. It was almost cathartic really. Near euphoric when I thought about my ever approaching breakthrough.

But becoming desperate to stop my ascension, Bidleid gathered his flies and fired a concentrated blast from thousands of them at the same time, using everything he had to kill me, much like Tsufaame had done against Ajuka.

In response, I used [Space] at full power for the first time in the fight as I brought my hand down in a slow slash, feeling my power surge as I did so and ultimately… it just finally clicked as I finished the motion.

What happened next was the creation of what would be named the Liberation Line later in the future as the sky and land split as far as the eye could see. The slash even left a slowly recovering wall of damaged space depicting where it had passed.

The Beelzebub's attack, left arm, leg and wing, alongside his flies were simply slashed apart by the overwhelming [Space]. He could only blankly stare in shock at his missing limbs and the cleaved space before he began to bleed massively and fainted from the pain and blood loss.

I caught the falling Satan, cauterized the new stumps, which caused the Satan to wake up in tremendous pain and then faint again, then opened a portal to the Hall of Satans where i had found Bidleid in the first place and went through to wait for the arrival of the others.

-Same time as the Anti-Satan faction aces swept through the last of the Satan faction armies.

"Lith actually did it!" An excited Serafall announced as she felt her friend break through and defeat Beelzebub.

"It seems that we have another strong ally joining our ranks." Sirzechs calmly stated as he looked over towards the finished fight.

"So his path is Space after all." Ajuka simply said as he analyzed the power being used in the great slash they had seen.

"Looks like it." Serafall said with a smile on her face before getting serious again, "But we can't fall behind on our jobs."

"I did feel a bit worried about letting him handle Bidleid, but it looks like that was unnecessary after all. And I agree with you Serafall, let's finish this war." Sirzechs said as he began using a bit more of his strength.

"Let's. I want to go back and finish the project I had to pause to fight here." Ajuka said as he returned to lead his troops.

At the same time the Aces felt Lith's breakthrough to Satan-Class, his legions saw the blue line which cleaved all in its path and knew their lord had won, causing their spirits to climb to a new high as the already suffering enemy forces to now despair.

As a result of the Anti-Satan faction's overwhelming advantage, they managed to defeat the Satan faction army defending the city and take control of Lucifaad within half of day.

Even the defenses left behind by the original Satans couldn't hold on against a combined assault from 3 devils surpassing them.

By the time Lith had returned from his fight, he could feel the three future Satans approaching the Castle itself, so he waited with the fainted Bidleid he locked in a spatial barrier.

He was a rather sorry sight now that Lith had a good look at him.

No longer the self assured Satan Beelzebub who could do as he pleased and was one of the rulers of the Underworld. Now he was a defeated and disheveled man with ruined clothes, missing limbs and broken spirit.

As Lith was contemplating the changes in his demonic power and how his [Space] had changed as a result, the grand doors to the Hall of Satans burst open as the three Aces revealed themselves. No doubt to find Lith himself and more importantly, the man he had fought.

They had had an agreement after all.

The only reason they had agreed to let Lith fight the man was at the condition he brought him back alive so that everyone could see the end of the last genocidal Satan and declare a new era for devils. Without the oppression of the Satan Houses.

"Liiiith!" Serafall immediately shouted happily as she flying hugged the devil sitting on the semi-circular table. "You're not hurt anywhere are you?"

"I am perfectly fine Sera. Better than fine even. I get what you meant when you said it just clicks too." Lith answered as he started basically pampering the adorable young woman as she took a seat on his lap again.

It was becoming a pattern, but Lith wasn't going to complain that's for sure.

"Ooh, I know right! It's like you're going whoosh and bam, the suddenly it just comes to you!" She excitedly replied as she childishly put it.

This was her way of de-stressing from the fact that she had to kill a lot of people today. Acting childish with someone who understood that silently and went along with it was something that meant a lot to her. She hated fighting and having to kill others, even if it was for good reasons and so fewer people would die. She was a kind girl after all.

"It is hard to properly put into word isn't it? I doubt any description would feel right for another devil since it is such a personal thing." I commented as the two other aces approached.

"Yeah. I tried to explain it to dad but he just couldn't wrap his head around it. I couldn't even really understand Sirzechs' or Ajuka's when I asked. But Ajuka said he could understand some of mine since he said he was smarter." Serafall responded before leaning in to whisper, "I think he's lying just to look smarter."

"I was not. I simply am smarter than you Serafall." Ajuka said in a rather relaxed mood compared to how he had been until now.

What the other two didn't now was that this was for two reasons: the first was that Lith hadn't betrayed them and had indeed fought, defeated and captured Bidleid Beelzebub, not backstabbing them and having his impressive army attack them from behind, while the other was the much more subtle fact that Lith was not sitting in any of the thrones around him.

The reason the second was important is psychological in nature, but it basically eliminated the possibility of Lith wanting to gain a type of authority similar to the Satans as he chose to not sit where they had ruled from.

"I don't believe you." Serafall replied to the Astaroth heir as she blew her tongue out at him and the two started to bicker.

"Haha! This brings back memories." Sirzechs cheerfully commented as the simple recreation of the interaction his two friends had years ago allowed him to feel a burden being lifted off of him for a moment.

"I take it that means they were always like this then?" Lith asked as he found the situation amusing.

It was like an energetic but smart girl arguing with the one student who beat her scores during exams.

"That they are, with Serafall usually making Falbium take her side while he was too lazy to try to go against her." Sirzechs fondly answered nostalgically.

"I could see that. But weird question: how did he lose his hair so young?" Lith asked out of pure curiosity.

"Ah, that. Well apparently it has something to do with his clan trait. They specialize in defensive magic and supposedly it protects their bodies to a certain degree. The problem comes when they reach a certain level of strength with their clan trait and it forms a passive defense which is more powerful in vital areas like the heart and skull, the latter being so strong that it results in Glasya-Labolas' main House members to lose their hair." Sirzechs explained as Lith simply looked at him almost disbelievingly.

"Just… Damn. What they gave up for power." Lith said as he thought about the plume hair he had grown to enjoy.

"Indeed." Sirzechs said as he too liked his crimson hair.

"I don't need your pity… my naps are better without hair in the way." A deadpanned Falbium said as that made Sirzechs jump a bit, while Lith knew exactly what he was saying when he had felt the man teleport in.

"My apologies." The red head said to his friends sheepishly.

"It's fine." Falbium simply said as he looked at the bickering Serafall and Ajuka, which wasn't anything new, just that Serafall was somehow doing it from the young Lord Azaroth's lap, while said lord being completely uninjured, a Satan-class and the heavily beaten Beelzebub were new things though. "Congratulations."

"Thank you Sir Falbium." Lith simply replied as he decided to calm Serafall down by taking out some cookies for her, making her immediately zero in on them and start munching, ignoring a baffled Ajuka in the process, "What can I say? My chef's cookies are the best."

"How much for them?" Ajuka nearly asked in desperation.

"Why would you want to buy cookies?" Lith asked slightly confused.

"In case I ever need a distraction." He seriously answered as he looked at the very distracted Serafall.

"We'll see if we can work something out." Lith replied understanding his plight a bit.

That's why he not only had cookies, but a variety of cakes and pastries, as well as juices, teas and snacks in his storage. He even put in extra work to have sections specifically made to keep things warm or cold, with his first time dilations even being for this.

Lith would be damned if he wasn't prepared to distract emotional women with delicious food or make the younger girls happy. It also served as Ophis preparations.

Of course when even then the stuff comes closer to not being fresh, he donates the food to various places.

So with a look which said 'I'll hold you to that', everyone then turned their attention to the approaching Zekram Bael.

The authoritative man saw the group which consisted of the most powerful devils currently in the Underworld and approached them as the leader of the Anti-Satan faction.

"It would seem you have kept up your end of the agreement Lord Azaroth. And that congratulations are in order." He commented as he glanced at the Beelzebub.

It did hurt him slightly to see how far the son of one of the people he had respected fall so low, but this had to be done for the good of the Underworld.

"Thank you Sir Zekram." Lith politely replied.

Nodding curtly he turned to the four aces, "It is time to officially finish this war."

The five knew what he meant, so Lith undid his spatial barrier and floated his defeated foe as they all left the Hall of Satans.

The seven devils reappeared in the sky over Lucifaad, its inhabitants and the entire Anti-Satan coalition army. Ajuka then casted a spell which created a large hologram of us all, so they could all see and hear what was going to happen. And Zekram awoke the Satan to make sure he could at least have final words out of some measure of respect.

Sirzechs then moved forward with the captured Beelzebub.

"Today we have succeeded in securing a brighter future for us all!

The tyrannical rule brought forth by the four Satan Houses has driven the Underworld to its knees through their unceasing desire for war, but we have said no more!

I am proud of each man and woman who had the courage to stand against what had been considered natural since the creation of our race! I am proud to have led you and to have fought beside you! To have succeeded alongside side you in defeating each figure thought unassailable!

This is a victory not just for us, but for those who will come after as we will make the Underworld a brighter place with hopes for the future!" Sirzechs passionately said to all present as cheers of support, victory and relief sounded across the city.

"Any last words Bidleid Beelzebub?" He then said to the man they had woken up before the speech.

The man seemed to have gotten some of his spirit back as he glared at them all with pure hatred, even more so for Lith.

"The blood and wrath of the Satans shall always stand against you." He venomously declared.

"Then we shall stand against them as well to preserve the future of the Underworld." Sirzechs responded as he engulfed the Satan in his [Destruction], leaving nothing behind of the last hostile Satans.

Cheers erupted as the six most powerful figures of the Anti-Satan Faction stayed above them all as symbols of the new era to come.

They had won and the civil war was over.

_______________________________________

EXTRA AUTHOR NOTES:

After this time is going to be passing by very quickly in general. At least until known things start happening.

Lith isn't going to have a true major power up during this time, but will slowly be developing all his abilities as a devil.

His peerage was decided before I even started writing this fanfic, with the last member and youngest member to join it being Koroka. The rest are for me to know and you all to guess.