Asmodeus’s muscles expanded as the ray of scarlet devastation poured out of his finger, draining half of his mana and a substantial amount of Abyssal energy.
The collision of energies created a distorted zone between them, a foul stench from the burned venom leaking like a stink bomb.
"Damn, that stinks."
Valena wafted her wings towards the multicoloured clouds ahead, trying to diffuse and push the odour away. The surrounding space cracked, with most of the webbing burnt to a cinder by her super-heated fireball.
"How are you feeling? There’s nothing wrong with your right?" Asmodeus placed a hand on the soft neck of Valena with a concerned question. She lowered her thin pupils to et him while snorting smoke from her nostrils.
"Apart from the foul stench of that disgusting insect, and the sting of smoke in my throat... no, I am—!?" Suddenly, the golden barrier around her body shattered. Valena slamd her claw against Asmodeus and took flight. "Go!" Nurous strands of black thread veiled her body mid-air, muffling her shout.
She struggled, biting and tearing the webs, but for every one she broke, ten followed, as the dragon’s body vanished in less than five seconds.
"Valena!"
Asmodeus called out to her figure wrapped in a sphere of black and reached out. He’d noticed the fracture of his divine domain a mont too late.
"You better not harm her."
His hair fluttered, floating into the air as he stepped on the black threat, walking towards her floating figure. With each footstep, Asmodeus’s body transford, releasing the form he swore to seal without a mont’s delay.
He glanced through the distortion with golden pupils.
"Stop hiding like a fool, co out and face . Abyssal."
[Kekeke, has losing your dragon drive you mad? Did you think a re devil with divine powers would stand a chance where a dragon didn’t?]
Asmodeus leaned his head to the right, his pupils shrinking into slits, resembling Valena’s but with a more aggressive and masculine shape. "Oh, really? Then I’ll co to you." He lifted his foot and vanished.
Bzzt!
The Abyssal ca into view the mont Asmodeus teleported into the distorted zone.
[Y-You?! What is that ability... my domain, why can you ignore it?!]
He ignored the arachne’s question and placed his hand against the air, a bright light wrapped in purple light as the two fused. "I rembered sothing thanks to you."
Within the warped atmosphere, his eyes half black and half gold, focused on the green spider. "That, to stop you from feasting on my divine energy, I just needed to wrap it with another. One you couldn’t swallow, an energy that can kill you."
Crackles of purple, black and golden lightning arced from Asmodeus’s body as he entered a pseudo Abyssal Sovereign form.
Ti slowed to a halt outside of the deford zone.
[Worm, do you honestly believe that little bit of strength is enough to go against , Zazel, the origin of land?!]
"Zazel, Zaaaazel... never heard of you, now perish."
Asmodeus mouthed the words bang.
A burst of purple light shone from his palm, enveloping the spider with a massive explosive force, with several waves of pure force. Asmodeus shook from the intense shockwave, hearing a pop in his ear, followed by a sharp stabbing ache.
Yet he didn’t move.
He watched the sizzling ground and narrowed his eyes.
"Stop playing dead, spider... how many of your kind do you think I’ve squished under my boot?"
[WRETCH!]
In anger, the spider appeared behind him.
He flung seven sharp spears made of black webbing at Asmodeus.
Asmodeus followed them with his eyes. He unconsciously tightened his abdon, pumping his energies with more force. The world decelerated further, and even the Abyssal was unable to resist this ti as his movents slowed greatly.
"Foolish, bug."
He tilted his head to the side, avoiding one, leaned to the right, avoiding another. Asmodeus flicked the third with his forearm. The sharp tip pierced his exoskeleton, leaving a sizzling green hiss. "Oh?"
Without pause, his movents sped up, twisting and looping around the web spears while focused on the spider. He took in the abyssal’s movents, attacks, patterns... constantly dodging, parrying and preparing himself.
Bzzt!
With another buzz, Asmodeus sat calmly on a piece of rubble with crossed legs behind the huge spider, which eagerly looked around trying to find him.
"Hey, is this all you have to offer?"
[Y-You... what, what are you?!]
The spider’s voice in his mind changed completely, no longer haughty as if so divine being, but a tinge of emotion poked through.
"What do you an? I’m just a harmless little devil, as you said earlier."
It raised its leading legs in a threatening manner.
[Don’t play gas with , mortal!]
Asmodeus pushed off the rubble, his body vanished, teleporting several tres in random directions at every step.
1...
2...
3...
Inside his mind, he constantly counted the speed at which the spider reacted; its movents beca increasingly sluggish with each teleportation.
"Mortal, since when did I ever say I was mortal?"
However, the spider’s response took an entire four seconds.
[What?! Foolishness, that insane person would never allow another true god to be born!]
Asmodeus didn’t rush to kill the spider, which shifted in the centre of its own webbing like a little rabbit fearful of death. He probed the spider with questions every five teleports. The strange resembled hypnotism.
"Ah, you’re right. Those pesky Arbiters keep chasing and saying I have to die."
To this sentence, the spider took nine seconds to respond.
’So this is the level of power I must exert to buy myself ten seconds...’ Asmodeus curled his lips, testing this strange, makeshift domain which used his other energies. ’If it wasn’t for i or Valena, would I have thought to try this... probably not. I’m not that quick on the uptake when it cos to intellectual things.’
He wasn’t pretentious and knew his strengths.
"Now then, what about you. Why do you hide here when you have such great control over the Earth and surroundings?"
[...What?! How!]
Instantly, the spider’s eight eyes widened, and it skittered away from Asmodeus; the previous strong resistance collapsed.
’So the people themselves don’t even know their bodies are moving slower, good.’
"Hey, stop quivering like a dog. You ntioned the Abyssal Origins... who do you an?"
The reference to creatures of origin greatly interested Asmodeus. He’d heard Serena ntion such a thing once after they had sex, but whenever he tried to push further, she’d always avoid the subject.
’That night, she was more wild and asked to leave marks all over her body.’
Asmodeus put it down to the mood.
So, with this huge spider knowing the truth, how could he let him die so easily? Asmodeus appeared behind the spider and grabbed one of the spider’s huge legs.
Crack!
"Hmph!"
With one hand pressing against the spider’s body, he tore it off.
[ARGH!!!!]
The spider curled up and tried to scurry away.
However, before it could escape, Asmodeus grabbed another leg, dragging it back towards him, creating deep fissures in the ground. Then yanked the spider down to the ground with a smirk upon his lips.
"Now then, tell about the Origins."
The spider curled up and tried to scurry away.
However, before it could escape, Asmodeus grabbed another leg, dragging it back towards him, creating deep fissures in the ground. Then yanked the spider down to the ground with a smirk upon his lips.
"Now then, tell about the Origins."
[Who would tell yo—ARGH!]
He tore another leg, tossing it away, and grabbed another. "You might be able to grow these things back over ti, but what happens if I rip that human body from your torso next? Don’t waste my ti, it’s too valuable for a bug like you to waste."
’Well, I can maintain this zone for another three hours, and only three seconds will pass outside.’
[I’ll talk! I’ll talk, so stop!]
The spider eventually surrendered, rolling into a huge ball.
Soon, the humanoid figure cracked its neck before climbing from the huge shell of a spider, forming clothes with a black thread.
"Hm? You don’t have any bits."
"... Is that really important, monster?"
"Who is the monster? Look in the mirror, I am a handso young Emperor."
"..."
Asmodeus watched the bald male with writhing veins beneath his flesh, and the man did the sa to him, before finally opening his mouth.
"In the beginning, we were a group of normal adventurers." The spider paused, Zazel’s eyes closed as he took a long breath. "So even called us saviours when we stepped into that strange gateway that suddenly appeared."
’Four people... four origins.’
The story followed a similar path to how Asmodeus used to be Ryuji when he was summoned here. Still, these four people were summoned to this continent before the false gods, or even the arbiters, existed.
They were the first arbiters, guides for the founding races.
"So, who were the origins?"
The spider paused, his shoulders shook... but when Asmodeus smiled, the man shuddered and started speaking nervously. "I’ll speak, I will!"
He adjusted himself, nervously looking around.
"There was I... Zell, of the land. I can adjust or change the surrounding land and Earth at least until eting you or people stronger than ."
"Hmmm, so your domain wasn’t quite space, no wonder you didn’t just cut off the oxygen and kill instantly," Asmodeus whispered to himself.
"Eh, what?"
"Nothing continues, tell the others."
"There was an abyssal who, like , chose to use the sea as her domain and looked after the sirens after the great war."
"The other male, he chose a different path and used his domain to create a portal to so other place... it should be located on the continent, not the mainland."
"And finally... There was this psychotic woman who spoke about finding her fated husband... she wore a nun outfit and had pitch black hair and loved to tear people apart. Her na was Luna. But when she beca the Abyssal of Madness, she changed her na and created a new personality.
Asmodeus sat quietly, listening to the spider with a faint smile.
He learned a lot of information and gained several questions, but he didn’t discover the true reason why the abyssal beings and arbiters were like each other’s kryptonite.
"I guess only the creator knows, huh."
Zazel fearfully glanced at Asmodeus as he ntioned the creator, before speaking up.
"Will you let go now?"
"Eh, but you’re already a monster who helps people take slaves, torture people, and the blood on your hands is so thick."
"I’ve never done anything like that! The woman I liked asked to help her make a place to hold auctions, that’s all I’ve done!"
He looked at the bald spider and shook his head with a sigh.
"Why so tireso."
Before the spider could speak, Asmodeus thrust Axiom into his chest, the blade piercing him like a hot knife through butter.
"Eh?"
"Well, you shouldn’t have attacked my dragon, and you know the past of my empress. How could I leave you alive? Sorry."
Green blood poured from Zazel’s lips as he looked at Asmodeus in horror. "Y-You... married that psycho?! Ahaha....hahaha... okay.... I hope see, no wonder...." The humanoid form dropped to the ground, his body like a dried husk as Axiom burnished with a glossy shimr of energy.
Asmodeus shook his head and thought about the four origins and Serena.
He wasn’t certain it was her, but sohow, listening to her story in the past when she was still the goddess of darkness, it overlapped with the story Zazel told him.
"Well, I guess that would be the cliché ending...
But she always suited the moon better than darkness anyway."
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