82

Teleporting back to the Golden Hind, Drake's ship, Ains could feel the tension leaving his body. Everything worked out even better than he expected!

A second later, his spell, a spell which protected him from bludgeoning damage to some degree, subsided and Ainz was forced to slightly correct his assessment. Indeed, they tried to hit him when they were surprised by his teleportation, but after Ainz had immobilized them, they easily agreed to work with him. So even though he had encountered some speed bumps, Ainz could confidently congratulate himself on the fact that he once again had proved to be a good boss!

Meeting a new party, and worse a team of them, and asking for cooperation is always going to encounter a lot of problems. Ainz knew of this firsthand - and although he was never a boss, he had heard that a well-coordinated team is used in his old company company to decide how to test the strength of their potential partner when meeting a new business partner. This was not the most pleasant of occurence, but an integral part of the work of large companies. If you look at it from the point of view of Servants who were created as machines of destruction and assassination - something like "prove that you are strong enough for us to even bother listening to you" was quite expected. And the fact that Ainz had to prove his mettle in battle was perhaps a normal thing to Servants. Heck, didn't he have to do the same thing not so long ago with Drake?

"Oh, wow…" - Drake, a recent proof of such a line of thinking, took a step toward Ainz, - "You really did it... You had beaten the Argonauts like a group of bitches and had subjugated them... Admiral, my man, you are the coolest badassassest motherfucker that I know of!"

Ainz was slowly feeling a little uncomfortable, both from the praise and from how it was expressed, - "It was nothing special…"

"Nothing special?!" Drake interrupted Ainz right away, glancing at Ainz with a mixture of admiration and surprise, "You, my man, bitchslaped fucking Heracles!"

"There wasn't anyone strong among them..." - Ainz suddenly realized what Drake's words actually meant, "Heracles?"

"Who else?" Drake looked at Ainz with a huge grin. "Heracles himself! Or did you think that I couldn't kick Jason's ass? Pft, admiral, my flotilla would be enough to shoot his ship straight to the bottom of the Ocean, but Heracles remained the real problem... But you actually did it, you absolute madman, you actually bitchslapped Heracles! You're damn fucking cool, admiral!"

"Heracles…" - Ainz repeated again to himself, - "That is... The very same Heracles... The great hero... One of the hardest bosses…"

"I'm not sure about this 'boss' thing you're talking about, but yes, it's him," Drake nodded with a huge grin, watching the Argo beginning to approach the fleet, "Heracles himself, one of the coolest assholes the Earth has seen in all it's history!"

"Heracles..." Ainz repeated again while frozen in shock.

'I mean, it's not YGGDRASIL…' - Ainz felt his emotion being suppressed as his shock threatened to consume him - 'Holy... If I were actually fighting the same Heracles as in Yggdrasil... Oh my, I would have to use my WCI or call for help. And not just from his Servants, but a large amount of reinforcement from Nazarick... It would be enough if I had time to actually use my Noble Phantasm. Heracles was a boss who could cause damage with his weapons that could not be reduced by any ordinary abilities, was practically immune to all physical damage… And worst of all, he had a just inhuman level of regeneration, not to mention the fact that when his health is low he would fall into a berserker mode with a whole slew of new attack patterns. And all of these and it was just the first phase! In his third phase, he was a problem even for ten hundred-level players in specialized equipment... Once, back in the heyday of Ainz Ooal Gown, Ulbert once had to come up with some huge complicated plan to beat him. He had collected an insane amount of artifacts and he took two WCI with him to the battle! And yet he still only managed to defeat Heracles on the third attempt. And that was because of a happenstance combination of circumstances…'

Ainz shuddered inwardly at the memory of Ulbert's rants after he had managed to defeat him. The Heracles in Yggdrasil was one of the most powerful boss characters among the human races. Perhaps only comparable to Merlin, King Arthur, Morgan Le Fay... No, maybe even only with the Eternal Emperor, the Sun Guard... Well, there were plenty of these powerful bosses in YGGDRASIL - but all of them were bosses and any attempt to take them on alone was just suicide. The only one from this list that Ainz had once killed by himself was King Arthur. But such a thing only happened because he had managed to lure him into the trap that Amanomahitotsu had prepared beforehand. They had put two dozen debuffs on him, and then filled the battlefield with summons. And yet even with all this, he had only managed to defeat him by finding the split-second between usages of Arthur's ridiculously broken ability - 'Avalon' to make him go into his second phase where he can't use 'Avalon' anymore. After which, using the one second of delay between the transitions of his battle phases, catch Arthur with a cast of an instant-kill spell and then kill him with his ultimate skill 'The Goal of All Life Is Death'. A feat which took all of Ainz's ability to manage a battlefield. Were he to fight Heracles alone instead... haha...

Emotion suppression was activated a second time and Ainz exhaled.

While the idea of fighting Ygddrassil's Heracles fills him with dread, this Heracles has not become too much of a problem, at least not yet, Ainz once again sighed. If he were to fight Yggrassil's Heracles, he would have fled the battlefield and would have ceased any progress of the whole mission for the next couple of months. He would use this time to prepare all his abilities for an epic fight, a fight that he has no confidence in winning in.

"That's what I'm talking about," Drake slammed Ainz in an affectionate manner on the shoulder, "I don't know why you are so cool, but remember my word, you are the coolest badass motherfucker that I know of."

"Thank you," Ainz answered a little distractedly...

"HEY!" Ainz's thoughts were distracted by a loud shout from Nero, "YOU JUST BEAT HERACLES, DIDN'T YOU?!"

Ains saw Nero approaching him - Nero, who is bursting with anger for some reason. Although with the Emperor's youthful look, the truth was it looked like a childish resentment instead.

"Um... Yes?" Ainz answered hesitantly.

"HOW DO YOU DARE TO DO SUCH A GREAT THING WITHOUT MY PARTICIPATION?" - Nero, who had reached Ainz, looked at him with such a large amount of resentment that Ainz felt guilty of... something, apparently, that was very important, - "I! I, THE EMPEROR OF ROME! DID NOT SEE BATTLE WITH HERACLES! HOW COULD YOU?! I BELIEVED YOU! I TRUSTED YOU! I UMU YOU!"

Ainz suddenly felt that even the suppression of his emotions failed to save his poor mind.

Ainz's gaze then fell to Mashu who was hurrying to him and, expecting even further complication, decided to do what he had planned to do if Heracles from YGGDRASIL was in this world.

The secret technique, the last tactic to win any fight, the last trump card of Ainz Ooal Gown that allowed him to win any PvP battle.

Run away.

"Ahem, yes, I'm sorry for sure!" Ainz instantly acted, after which he looked at Mashu, who was already about to say something, definitely some kind of embarrassing praise, so he immediately started his plan, "At this moment I need to be present on a very important urgent matter! Definitely the key point of this Singularity!"

A second later, Ainz disappeared from the Golden Hind before Mashu could... First, praise him for defeating Heracles, and then tell him about the identity of her Servant half.

"Our fleet has become extremely... Lively with the presence of the new Admiral and his Servants," Mary Read glanced at the assembled crowd of Servants, who were discussing the new achievement of their admiral.

"And isn't that wonderful, Mary?" Anne Bonny lovingly stroked her musket, after which she stared at Blackbeard and his new friend, Mozart, hurrying somewhere.

Mary, looking at the same scene with her eyes, exhaled sharply, - "No."

Anne looked at the girl with a dumbfounded expression.

"This is not the type of fun I like," she said.

"Don't worry, Mary, big battles are definitely waiting for you soon," Anne smiled, after which she ran a hand through Mary's, who's wrapped in her cloak completely, hair.

Mary just looked up at Anne in response.

"What?" Anne smiled. "We are sailing in a huge pirate flotilla in the uncharted waters of the frontier in an unstable pocket world. It would be improbable for us to sail without at least one huge blood bath!"

Mary, hearing words that are quite inappropriate coming out of her friend's pretty face, nodded slowly.

"I'm not sure that we can manage to board any ship," Anne shook her head, "But I'm sure that in the end we will have some wonderful battle. The admiral is clearly collecting Servants under his command in preparation for a huge battle. And at the moment, including you and me, there are already... Fourteen of them! The Admiral wouldn't gather such a large group of strong combatants for nothing, right? We are clearly preparing for a grand battle!"

"I hope so," Mary, a sweet girl who was not taller than a child in size, only sighed so that anyone that hears her could understand that she wanted to take part in a huge battle, "So much time spent sailing and not a single fight... For us anyway."

"This is a temporary setback," - Anne dismissed the pessimistic thoughts of her friend, - "Just wait and you will see - it will be a real massacre!"

"Heh," Mary giggled a little, after which she looked at Anne, "But this time you won't steal my kills!"

"Never even thought of it!" Anne answered right away, smiling, after which she lovingly stroked a musket that is as large as herself, "But if I can find someone ahead of you with my baby's bullet, promise that you won't be too resentful!"

"But you are constantly 'finding' the ones that I have noticed first!" Mary looked at Anne with a frown, "I want at least a couple of trophies!"

"Okay, I'll leave some for you too," Anne smiled mischievously.

"What are you girls talking about?" A voice that spoke out near to them made the two girls look towards the man who had just appeared next to them.

Each part in the face and body of the speaker was polished to the highest level of beauty, where it was impossible to add even a single detail to improve the appearance of the speaker. Wearing black patent leather shoes, a gray formal suit, with a graceful cane in the hands of the man - everything in him looked so perfect that even Anne felt blood pouring on her cheeks.

"Girl secrets," she answered right away, a little coquettishly.

"Oh, is that so?" Baal smiled. "I hope you are not discussing me?"

"And if so?" Anne smiled.

"Then I would say my favorite phrase," Baal smiled seductively, "Speak of the..."

Without finishing what he is about to say, Baal froze in place suddenly.

"Oh, I'm sorry, ladies," Baal shook his head a little from side to side, "I sincerely wouldn't want to leave you so soon. But, alas, work awaits... In the end, as Ainz's right hand - I'm afraid that such a privileged position is always followed by the appropriate amount of responsibilities."

A second later, Baal took a step back, then literally dissolving into space.

"What a sweet young man," Anne smiled, "and what a handsome one at that..."

"I got goosebumps from him," Mary glanced at the spot where Baal had been a moment ago.

"In a good way?" Anne smiled.

Mary spoke very honestly, - "In a very fucking bad way."

"Tell me, my friend," Mozart sighed, looking at Blackbeard who is stalking forward, "Ah... Why do you need them?"

"Every true fourchan dweller keeps a stock of porn under their bed!" Blackbeard looked at Mozart in confusion, "These are traditions!"

"Wouldn't it be easier to simply store it on your computer?" Mozart looked at Blackbeard carefully.

"No shit my man!" Blackbeard looked at Mozart as if he's an idiot, "But if you haven't noticed, then the situation with the wireless Internet is kinda bad in this world, as in non-existent. Besides, as I said before, these are traditions!"

"Yes, of course, traditions," Mozart breathed out, "Traditions have to be respected..."

"Yeah, I have them under the bed!" After that nonsensical reply, Blackbeard took a step inside the cabin, "Come in, be at home — only you're not at home. And I'm also not at home. This is not a home at all, but a ship. And with that in mind - everything is like I said, be at home!"

Mozart took a step inside, after which he felt the pressure of the barrier descend on his shoulders.

"Barrier blocking the transmission of messages" - Mozart nodded to himself, after which he looked at Blackbeard. The now revealed traitor, realizing that Mozart felt the barrier, immediately stopped in his tracks, then spoke with a tone that is very different to his usual one, "The minimum precautions were taken."

"Did you notice it?" Blackbeard twisted his nose and sighed," Listen... I really haven't met any good fellow for a while... This guy will only get a bit of memory from you. So just don't move, or do anything unnecessary and nothing bad will happen to you"

After a second, a short figure of a man wearing more modern clothes appeared next to Mozart. The man wore a white T-shirt, a pair of jeans and with an ordinary, completely unremarkable face of a passerby who could pass by any observer's attention under ordinary conditions. His unexpected appearance next to Mozart could surprise a less prepared Servant, however, Mozart, having heard everything from a mile away, was hardly moved. And although the young man who was slowly approaching him did not impress at all with his ordinary appearance - Mozart could hear and feel the boards under his feet slowly caving in with each of the newcomer's steps. What's worse, the barrier that had to cut Mozart out from any help became denser the closer the stranger comes to him.

"Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart," the man breathed out, taking a step toward the Servant, "Honestly, it's ironic that it's you of all people who got caught in this all... Indeed, no matter how you strive to run away..."

Mozart, hearing a mockery in the man's words, smiled, "Well, the last time I was trapped, I managed to escape. Who knows, maybe this time I will succeed too?"

After a second, Mozart's body was pierced by several stakes made from the rising boards of the ship.

"Hey, don't break the boat!" Blackbeard immediately complained with his friend, "And you promised that you would just scan his memory! Mozart no touch!"

"This is to prevent him from twitching," The man sighed, after which he took a step toward Mozart. Slowly, the disguised Demon King held out his hand, - "Now, please do not twitch - and I will read your memory…"

"OBJECTION!" After a second, a cane rested against the back of the head of the Demon King.

Catching Mozart's perplexed look, Baal shrugged, "Well, everyone here is talking with references — I also wanted to insert one."

The Demon King froze for a second, feeling a new, unexpected person to appear next to him, and then slowly began to raise his hands up, "What..."

"Stop," Baal said instantly, "Keep your hands in place."

"I will get tired," objected the Demon King.

"You can bear it," Baal sighed, after which he glanced at Blackbeard. He, as skillfully as possible, tried to falsely whistle to appear innocent, showing with all his strength that he was clearly not involved in this business, - "But I can guess... You wanted to ask 'what gave us away'?"

The Demon King, standing still, sighed, "Yes."

"Oh, this is a very interesting question," Baal smiled, "Cainabel would've probably not answer you at all and would just kill you... But, hmm..."

A second later, Baal fell silent and rolled his eyes, "Speak of the Devil..."

Mozart wanted to see if Cainabel really had appeared next to them - since even his hearing could not catch such information. But Baal shook off the possibility and smiled, - "Oh, it was not at all that difficult…"

A second after the monstrous Servant disappeared from the island, Beleth, after waiting three minutes, teleported to the island, while trying not to betray his excitement. Apparently, Balam had fallen into his own trap...

"Idiot," Beleth muttered to himself, shaking his head. Of course, there is always a need for an idiot in any plan. If he had wanted to put his head into the mouth of a lion, then Beleth could only sympathize with the idiot and include him in his own plan.

His plan had gone on swimmingly, that is of course until the thing with the bloody island happened especially that bloody Servant... Why did she even need to use her abilities and managed to see his mark on this island?! If it weren't for this, Beleth would now calmly be watching Balam's misadventures from his fully equipped shelter... But no, damn those two busybodies, the chance to observe the Servants of an unknown enemy is rarely given, so Beleth was forced to take this chance even though his cover is blown. Of course, just in case, before coming here, he had checked the island for their presence, but apparently the Servants had chosen to leave the island. Apparently, having received their confirmation, the strange girls had disappeared from the island... Surely they went to inform their Master that Beleth had been here and became informed of the place where an unknown enemy could appear... It is a pity, but apparently he will have to work quickly just in case.

Beleth felt his inhuman body, a column of flesh, descend on the sand of the beach, and then began to act quickly. Mana Sample, Track Sample, Servant's...

"KHA!" After only a second, Beleth suddenly felt a sharp pain blooming on his body. It is only due to the lack of lungs that he was now not spitting blood due to the damage inflicted on him, "WHAT?!"

Beleth tried to turn around - he was sure that there were no enemies on the island! He tried with all his effort to turn, but could not even budge a bit from his position.

"Teleportation! Teleportation!" - Beleth instantly panicked and tried to escape. But after a second a new wave of panic seized him - "Teleportation does not work! They had found us! "

"Problems, Demon King?" A girl's voice suddenly sounded in front of him before her figure appeared before Beleth from a vortex of teleportation, "You can stop trying to escape. The tintoy may be weak, but this does not mean that she cannot be used at all…"

Beleth froze, after which he felt the blade stuck in him slowly leaving his body. After another couple of seconds, he heard light footsteps in the sand behind him, and then next to the monstrous Servant. The thing that he had been afraid of all this time - a short-haired girl in a Gothic outfit - another girl had appeared. This one though he recognized.

"Attila!" Beleth instantly panicked. "Damn you Attila!"

"Don't twitch," Cainabel smiled, "Or it will be more painful for you."

"What was the chance that our team would accidentally run into Drake's drifting fleet in this Singularity?" Baal asked a rhetorical question, "In fact, not so small at all. She has a huge fleet that is plowing the seas - sooner or later it would most likely have happened... But why give fate a chance when everything can be taken into your own hands, right?"

Baal smiled, and then slowly pressed on his cane, pressing it against the skull of Balam's human body.

"Drake is an ideal puppet," Baal smiled, "Hot, playful, not smart, strong - and most importantly, with a great mentality. First beat me - and then say what you want to say…"

"It was so easy," Baal smiled. "Just pit Ainz against Drake. Indeed, in a fight with her, he would be forced to show at least some of his abilities. Just a drop - but still some information can be gained."

"The plan failed almost immediately," Baal shook his head, "nothing would be visible for a long distance, but you already knew about Ainz's barrier against espionage. Fortunately, you had a backup…"

"Can you be quicker please?" Mozart, in whose body wooden stakes were still stuck on, looked at Baal quite displeased.

"No, no, I like it, let him explain!" Blackbeard smiled, after noticing Mozart's chilly gaze, coughed into his fist, "That is... Yes, for sure, get to the point."

"Tsk, no style at all," Baal sighed, then, noticing the Demon King trying to slowly move his hand, he pressed his cane even harder, forcing Balam to slowly bow his head, "But, do remember to keep your hands to yourself! So, on what place I stopped... Oh yes, your plan... If such a slapdash of forlorn hopes, of course, can be called a plan - only three steps…"

"But you almost got caught in it," Mozart answered Baal.

"Yes, I got the wrong information," Baal shook his head, "Everyone was sure that there could be only one Demon King in a Singularity... But oh well, we had deviated from the topic..."

Baal thought for a second, - "And so, Drake is defeated, but there is no information to be gained, what to do?.. Hmm, so you needed to send someone whom Ainz won't be able to defeat so easily. For example, the Argonauts... Heracles, after all, is one of the strongest Servants in the world, it will definitely be easy for him to make Ainz become serious, won't he? Moreover, in order to secure his participation in the battle - it was only necessary to say that Jason had stolen the Grail. After all, no one will bother to communicate with someone who has already fought with their ally, Drake. They had stolen the Grail - and most importantly, if you just slightly twist the personality of Jason, so that he would immediately attack Ainz…"

"But that shithead swept Heracles effortlessly!" Balam spat through gritted teeth.

"Because your plan was destined to fail from the very beginning when Ainz had entered the game," Baal smiled, "But, fortunately, you had a backup plan."

"I can't call myself a connoisseur of modern culture," Baal shook his head, "But I am attentive. The plan to take control of Blackbeard was, of course, an elegant plan. A dirty idiot speaking an incomprehensible language…"

"Hey!" Blackbeard was indignant.

"No one will notice the difference between his normal behavior and when he is under control, no?," Baal smiled, "After all, no one cares about the way he speaks as he does, isn't it? Or is it?"

"Technically, the gathering of the four greatest Grand Blue pirates is called the Yonko," Baal shook his head, "But Blackbeard chose to call himself as one of the 'Shichibukai' instead, the traitorous pirates who had partnered themselves with the World Government, the enemy of the Yonko. Funny, isn't it?"

"Hold up, holdup, holup!" Blackbeard waved his hands around and looked at Baal in surprise, "How… how did you notice such a small thing?!"

"I am a very attentive man," Baal smiled and returned to observing Balam. "But, in any case, it made me think. It was so easy to unravel the essence of the trap - that's why I had supported the decision to execute Blackbeard…"

"Well, fuck you and thank you too, bastard!" Blackbeard looked at Baal, offended.

"I do not want to interrupt your great dialogue, explaining your great deductions. But, need I remind you, I am still pierced with stakes," Mozart glared at Baal.

"I am gradually coming to the end," Baal answered immediately, after which he looked at Balam, "So what was the plan? You were prepared for the fact that Ainz's fight would not be visible from afar - that means you had a way to see it closely. But how? Simple. It is to just find one who had seen it first hand and then steal their memory. Blackbeard was just like that - taken under control - not directly, but with a few easy mental manipulations... But you were lucky, Blackbeard was able to find and get along with someone better - quite by accident. Among Ainz's Servants, there was, perhaps, the only Servant whom Blackbeard would not offend enough to stain the ocean waters with his gastric contents…"

"Yes, enough already!" - Blackbeard flared up, - "I hate you dad! I mean, ikemen!"

"So you could trap Mozart and personally pump out the memory of his Master from him," Baal smiled with a sincere good-natured smile.

"By the way, talking about pumping out," Mozart piped up again, "My blood is currently pumping out of me!"

"And my dignity is dripping out of me drop by drop!" Blackbeard spoke out with a petulant voice.

Baal, tired of being interrupted in his villainous monologue, glanced at both Servants for a second, "Silence."

After that, the sound of the voices of both disappeared, allowing Baal to speak freely.

"Ainz is really brilliant," Baal smiled, "Instead of just getting rid of the rat, he found a way to use the rarest combination of Servants to pull the Demon King himself out of his hole without suspicion... Funny, did he see the future? Or did he just so perfectly planned everything out? Or maybe the plans of your "King" are nothing more than an open book for him, hmmm? Who knows…"

"Perhaps the only flaw in my plan was that without a personal meeting with you, I was not given the chance to find out that you alone are just a distraction," Baal smiled.

"What?" Balam jerked sharply, glancing at Baal, slowly coming to a realization "No!"

"Oh, yes," Baal plunged the mental knife into Balam with pleasure, after which he physically pierced Balam's body with his cane, "I asked you not to twitch..."

"The other Demon King is right now looking at the world with your eyes," Baal smiled, after which, enjoying Balam's surprised look, he nodded his head, "Apparently, friendship between the King's subordinates is not obligatory... What a pity…"

"You see, even if you die now," Baal pressed the cane harder, "And make no mistake, you will die now, don't worry, someone will be able to get at least some kind of information out of you... But, here's a coincidence of all the coincidences. Ainz had completely, by 'accident', sent the two Servants to the place where a Demon King equipped with an observation post. By 'accident' it turned out to be Cainabel and Altera, which attracted the attention of the Demon King. And then by 'accident' they attracted the attention of the Demon King with a huge transfer of mana that he could not ignore. After which, completely by 'accident', the now panicking Demon King caught the eye of the single Servant that could hold him back. A Servant that by 'accident' had been given a powerful artifact that could turn her invisible... Truly an accident of all accidents."

"And what will you do now?" Balam while dying, nevertheless looked at Baal.

"Oh, simply look at how the hunter and the hunted have their roles reversed," Baal smiled with a kind smile, "You wanted to get Mozart's memory and knowledge, but you're going to give me yours instead. Control amnesia."

Beleth looked at Attilla and the girl next to her.

"Air!" - suddenly he realized the reason for his paralysis - "The air around me is saturated with mana, so much so that it blocks my movement and teleportation!"

"Guessed it, huh? A tintoy can sometimes prove useful," Cainabel smiled at Beleth, and then took a step forward, slowly opening her mouth, which gradually transformed into a mouth of a monster, "But that doesn't matter. I want to hear your last wish."

"Tell me..." Beleth looked at Cainabel with one of his dozens of eyes, "How did you find us out?"

Cainabel froze for a second and then smiled - with her monstrous mouth, the smile came out horribly sinister - "I said that I will hear it, not that I will fulfill it."

After a second, Cainabel's mouth pierced into the flesh of the Demon King.

Beleth and Balam felt their minds and memories undergo careful analysis. Information about themselves - abilities, personal qualities, life before becoming the Demon Kings... Information that has now essentially become useless information.

Gradually, however, Cainabel's ability and Baal's magic plunged further and further.

Beleth suddenly realized that he couldn't get out of here alive. No, death was not dangerous for a Demon King — but these creatures... Whoever they were — they were able to destroy a Demon Kings irrevocably, with no chance of rebirth. In other words, their life was over.

And Beleth suddenly realized a simple truth.

He cannot escape from here. No way. Now they will simply drain out all the knowledge from him, and then they will kill him. However, Beleth also knew something else...

If right now he destroys his body, his core... Then they will not be able to receive any information from him.

But if he were to do that, it would kill Beleth. Irrevocably. The very concept of 'Demon King Beleth' will be destroyed. Even his King will not be able to return Beleth as he is. He will only be able to create his body and mind anew. In effect creating some other Demon King named Beleth.

Beleth grinned.

"So this is how he killed Lev and Baal" - Beleth understood it all, after which he looked at Cainabel who is devouring his body - "He represents a danger with his crafty mind and not with brute force, this unknown enemy... His strength is with his Servants. The unknown Master himself only guides them with his mind. He did not need to kill the Demon Kings - he only needed to force them to commit suicide. How... Cruel. "

Beleth grinned again and reached for Balam.

"I never loved you, asshole" - Beleth grinned right in his mind.

"You set me up, you shithead" - Balam exhaled.

After which both Demon Kings, realizing that they had no other choice, decided on their last action.

They both understood that they would die - but they could die as heroes, keeping crucial information and the plan of their King out of the hands of his enemy to the bitter end. Or they could die like beaten dogs, in a ditch, with everything taken from them by the enemy.

In this case, it was not heroism that forced them to act, but banal pragmatism.

After which both Demon Kings instantly turned to dust.

Cainabel teleported to Baal a few seconds later, forcing him to watch as Blackbeard wiped a pool of blood from the floor of his cabin. Using his hands and a rag.

"Let him suffer just a little bit," Baal answered calmly to Cainabel's raised eyebrow. "I suppose your Demon King also turned to dust for some reason."

"Yeah," Cainabel sighed, after which she looked at Baal, "But I managed to get some information."

"Good," Baal nodded, after which he glanced at Blackbeard. "Me too. What did you manage to get?"

"There are four Demon Kings in the Singularity," Cainabel glanced at Baal.

'Hmm, she didn't even bother lying…' - Baal was surprised for a second. With the information she possessed, it was too easy for her to give Baal the wrong information to undermine his reputation with Ainz... But she did not. Should Baal then have to answer her with gentlemanly politeness?

"Good," Baal nodded. "And there are two Grails in the Singularity."

Type: Self \ Anti-Target

On the one hand, 'The Goal of All Life is Death' as a Noble Phantasm is primarily a buff that enhances Ainz's abilities in a certain way. However, on the other hand, this Noble Phantasm has a special ability that could be aimed at any chosen target. Of course one could say that by narrowing the target of the ability to "Anti-army" or "Anti-fortress" or even "Anti-world" implies that there are targets on which this ability will not work on. This, of course, is not true. After invoking this Noble Phantasm, any designated target will be affected. Therefore, it is impossible to narrow down the reach of the Noble Phantasm with the more standard possible targets of a Noble Phantasm.