Faded Gods and Chaos.

The near-infinite streams of energy of Chaos continued to assault Maulketh, Grimnar, and Leman, causing parts of their bodies to be erased into nothingness. Despite the agonizing pain that this brought about, their domains continued to grow ever stronger as the energy of Chaos was devoured and consumed for their uses.

Every passing second, large sections of Maulketh's mountain-sized body were gone, at one point he felt his entire tail vanish which caused him no lack of rage. In his rage, his Domain empowered by three extra Concepts fought even harder and regrew his tail stronger than ever.

But, something odd was happening to his two two Dragon Hearts and his Demon core. Every second, more and more Tyranic Essence was being produced that contained higher and higher amounts of Void Energy and Conceptual Energy.

Now, Chaos was being added to the mixture which was causing all sorts of changes. The energy of Chaos seemed to be highly compatible with Void and Conceptual Energies. When it was added to the mixture, in higher amounts something completely shocking happened.

The energy mixture flowing through his body was much purer which caused strange effects to happen in his body. His armor was being recreated from within causing the new nearly black and purple armor to be more resistant to the effects of Chaos.

Then his scales were reforged using the erasing properties of Chaos to enhance their strength. The effects happening outside of his body were more and more extreme as even his size began to grow.

In his focused state, Ddraig reached out to him as the energy flowing through the Boosted Gear was better than anything.

[I bet that fool Albion is wishing he was back.]

'I think so. Now, Ddraig, answer me this, Should I keep my Demon Dragon Core or absorb it into my Demonic Dragon Hearts.'

[Just absorb it. Having three of the things is kind of redundant, but the two hearts need to stay.]

Understanding what he meant, Maulketh caused his Concept to respond to him. His Draconic Dragon Core began to condense into energy which was a massive amount. This energy began to be absorbed evenly into his hearts which caused them to burn.

Tyranic Essence, Void Energy, Conceptual Energy, and Chaos all in one began to flow through his two Hearts as he fully integrated his Demon Core into his Hearts. This process took hours, or what felt like hours as time ceased to be in Chaos.

But when it was done, his two Hearts were stronger than ever. When they beat for the first time the near-endless energy that began to flow through him caused his Domain to push back with even more power.

He was not the only one going through unique changes, Grimnar and Leman both only had one heart. That was enough for them, but through the Soul Link they shared with Maulketh, they began to receive the energy flowing through his body and soul.

They took this energy and began to upgrade their Dragon Hearts with it. The stronger their hearts, the stronger they will be in the long run. As they did that, they finally released their holds on Maulketh's arms.

They began to drift away from him and each other as they did not need to rely on their master or each other. When he felt them do that, Maulketh smiled, but that just caused his teeth to vanish causing him to focus before new shiner and better teeth replaced them.

'Good luck you two.'

With them gone, Maulketh opened his eyes as he stirred from his former stillness. He took in a deep breath taking in the raw energies of Chaos into his lungs. The lungs of a dragon were different from their Hearts which produced energy.

The lungs burned the energy in their bodies and whatever they breathed in. In a regular animal, the blood flows through the lungs to be oxygenated, but not for Dragons. When their blood flowed through their lungs it was energized with the energy that the Dragon had or breathed in.

In this case, Chaos caused his blood to begin to carry those properties into his heart. But this also sped up the process of which parts of his body were erased. The damage to his lungs and hearts was extra painful, as even his two Demon Dragon Hearts had parts of themselves eroded away.

'I will be here quite a while. Good thing I have time.'

He closed his eyes and continued the process of absorbing Chaos energy through his breathing, and his Domain. But despite Chaos being called Infinite, he would prove that wrong.

Drawing on his mates, Concepts of Infinite and Chaos Karma, he sped up the process of his Concept. This pushed his body to the limit which once again began to use this reforge his body.

That gave him an idea. Drawing on his energy he pushed back the energy of Chaos away from him while he opened his hands. Using his control over Space and Time backed up by his Concept and energy he opened up another black hole for himself.

He kept it stable for a while before forcing it to begin to grow larger and larger until he could comfortably enter. When he released it from his control, instantly the singularity began to draw in everything around it with its massive gravitational pull.

He crawled inside of the blackhole where he was instantly subjected to the massive gravitational forces inside. But the black hole did one more thing, it drew in massive quantities of Chaos energy all at once.

More and more energy was drawn inside the black hole which caused him to drown in the sheer pressure of it all. Not being good enough, flames hotter than starts began to burn while black frost began to fall in the small area he found himself in.

But this black frost was colder than cold should ever be, lightning moving faster than the speed of light struck at his body while toxins and acids so potent flowed freely. Time and Space rendered at his body while his soul began to be attacked by the magical properties of his black hole and Chaos.

But here, he was at peace where reality bent to the extremes of his Concept. Here, his every cell was nurtured and his proud divine form was made ever stronger. By the second, he felt his nerves add new connections, and his veins and arteries warped to better transport the new energy.

His muscles tore, grew, and shifted to better handle the increasing pressure of his surroundings. His scales and armor became thicker, stronger, more energy-resistant, and his very soul became stronger as his Concept began to grow stronger slowly, but surely.

---

While Maulketh continued his never-ending chase for power, Leman and Grimnar did different things in Chaos. Leman took the calm route and simply used his Concept to temper his body. Meanwhile, Grimnar actively flew and traveled through Chaos.

Chaos was where Greek gods and Titans went to fade when they died and returned to their source. If that was the case, he would collect the shards of these Faded beings for himself and his master.

Currently, his center head opened its mouth and consumed an inconspicuous tiny particle. One of the many shards of the Titan of the Sun Helios. When humans began to worship Apollo as the god of the Sun, Helios faded away along with Selene Titaness of the Moon.

Grimnar was searching for the shards of the two Titans for his own power while actively searching for the shards of other such faded gods for his master. That tiny shard joined the few others he had collected already.

Feeling proud of himself, he continued his travels while parts of his body were erased. Not caring for such annoyances, he healed the damage and continued onward.

---

While Maulketh took the steps for his future War with the many gods of DC, the gods themselves were preparing for him. Wonder Woman had taken a trip to visit Hephestus. This Hephestus was truly ugly compared to the version that worked for Maulketh.

When the deformed god laid eyes on Wonder Woman as he hammered a piece of metal he paused.

"Diana, I take this is not a social visit?"

"Not at all Smith God. I wish to see if you can craft a-"

"Dragon or God slaying sword yes?"

Diana nodded.

"Yes."

Hephestus grinned as he tossed the metal he was forging into a pile of them.

"Ares has asked me the same thing. I made him a sword with both Dragon and God-slaying properties. Named it the Tyrant's Edge after that Dragon God of Tyranny as he calls himself. If you wanted one for yourself, well I did make a sister sword for that particular sword."

He walked into his workshop. pulled out a silver case and opened it up to show a double-edged bastard sword. The sword was a bright silver with several Greek runes that through the blade.

Reading them Diana saw they spelt the sentence The Slayer of Dragons and Gods. On the hilt was an image of a dragon being stabbed with a sword.

"How very on the nose."

Hephestus grinned.

"Yeah, but why beat around the bush? Take it. This one is named Liberator. Like always, you know the deal."

She nodded.

"Has a built-in weakness, I know. Now, are you sure this will work against Maulketh?"

Hephestus thought about it.

"That dragon said he is immune to Dragon Slaying weapons, whether that is true or not is to be determined. But, my work is never lacking so take his words with a grain of salt."

Remembering what Maulketh himself had told her when they had lost to his army which was still in his territory. But they had not seen him in over a month. As for the gates, they still spat out Territory Lords and their armies from time to time, but that was it.

No Continental Kings at all which was making them think that Maulketh was planning something. Just as she reached out and grabbed the sword's hilt. When she drew it out of the box, she gazed at the sword which instantly made itself known.

It glowed brighter which made her look at Hephestus.

"You're just giving it to me?"

"Lending it. If you manage to end his life, bring me some parts of him will you? What I could do with materials like that?"

Diana looked at the sword as she thought about Maulketh. He became an enemy because of their paranoia and he had not killed them even when he had the chance. As she was looking into the sword she felt her communicator go off in her ear.

She reached up to it.

"Cyborg, what's wrong?"

"Diana, we got trouble. Remember all those villains that Maulketh took from Arkam and Belle Reve, they are back and they were released in Gotham through a portal. Harley attacked Wayne Manor and kidnapped Damian."

"How? Harley is-"

"Part dragon. She transformed into a black toxic-scaled dragon-like creature. They all are, Killer Croc is fighting Superman over Gotham right now. They are saying they were sent by Maulketh."

She sighed. She gripped the sword tight as she realized she did not have any choice.

"You got the sheath for this?"

Hephestus tossed her one into which she put Liberator. As she walked off she placed the sword on her back as she made up her mind. She would try her best to not kill Maulketh if she even could. Instead, she would try to make him see reason.

There had to be a way to avoid all-out war because last time, they had only faced Maulketh's army and they had lost. They could not win, not as they were now, so avoiding war was the best they could do. For now.

'Gods give me strength. I am going to need it.'