Chapter 586: The New Territory
The air slled of sulfur and iron.
A heavy wind blew through the dead trees, carrying with it the distant murmur of ancient souls. Vergil walked ahead, his boots sinking into the sandy, blackened ground—the rhythmic sound of his footsteps echoed like the beating of a hellish heart.
Behind him walked the three of them—Valerie, Gwen, and Kaori—in silence, each in their own world of regret and tension. The sha was almost palpable in the air. They still felt the weight of the scolding he had given them hours earlier, just after he had freed them from the underground prison. None of them dared even breathe loudly.
Vergil, on the other hand, seed calm.
Too calm.
As he walked, his gaze road the vastness of the territory before him—a newly claid domain, still in the process of transformation. The hellish landscape stretched as far as the eye could see: a raw fusion of forest, rock, and fire. The scent of ancient magic and corruption hung in the air like a mist.
“Hmph…” he murmured, his hands in the pockets of his black coat. “New ho, huh?”
His tone was calm, but his blue eyes glinted with sothing else—anticipation. Dominance. A kind of quiet pleasure in seeing chaos molded to his will.
He stopped on a rise and surveyed the scene.
The front of the forest had already been cleared—twisted trees uprooted, the black wood piled in mounds that burned with blue flas. Strips of land were being delimited by energy lines, erecting ethereal barriers.
Further ahead, Selene and Zuri worked.
The forr, erect and elegant as ever, wore a long black dress that seed to absorb the light around her. Her silver hair flowed even without wind, and in her hands floated dozens of small runic symbols, fitting together in the air like pieces of a celestial puzzle.
Zuri, on the other hand, displayed her hybrid form—half human, half serpent. Golden scales blended with her dark skin, and her slitted eyes narrowed as she sensed his presence.
Selene was the first to notice. She turned, her gaze cold and respectful.
“Vergil.” Her voice echoed, sweet and somber at the sa ti. “He’s back, it seems.”
Vergil slowly descended the slope, the three generals following behind.
“Yes.” He looked around appraisingly. “It seems you didn’t waste any ti.”
The ground trembled slightly beneath their footsteps.
Zuri glided toward him with a fluid movent, her serpentine body undulating across the ground.
“Hmph. When you’re competent, there’s no reason to delay,” she replied, her forked tongue hissing between words.
Selene, without looking away, simply reached out and pulled from her dress a scroll of aged paper marked with infernal symbols. With a quick gesture, the air stirred, and the parchnt floated to Vergil, stopping right before his eyes.
He took the map, unrolling it slowly.
The black and crimson lines danced across the surface of the paper, pulsing like living veins. It was a complete map of the territory, and the level of detail impressed him.
There were four main areas precisely delineated:
1. The Forest of the Apocalypse, a living mass of demonic trees that breathed and moved at night.
2. The Crimson Desert, vast and dotted with gigantic bones and sandstorms that scread forgotten nas beyond flaming rivers of lava.
3. The Mountains, where traces of magical ore and creatures slumbered beneath the infernal ice could be seen.
4. The Canyon, a colossal crack in the ground, from which emanated the distant sound of sothing pulsing—sothing alive.
In the lower corner, there was still a discreet spot marked with silver paint. An entrance—small but deep—that led to the bowels of hell.
Vergil raised an eyebrow, a slight smile appearing on his face.
“Impressive.” He looked at Selene. “You mapped all this in… a few days?”
Selene bowed slightly. “A day and forty-nine hours, to be exact.”
Zuri crossed her arms, snorting lightly. “It was easy after you destroyed the Confusion Matrix covering the sector. Without it, the boundaries of the territory revealed themselves as bloodlines beneath the earth.”
“Hmph…” Vergil closed the map and tucked it into his coat. “Quick and accurate. That’s how I like it.”
Valerie, behind him, looked at Gwen and whispered,
“They’ll end up getting a raise, I bet.”
Gwen replied in a wry murmur:
“After what we did, he’s more likely to cut ours.”
Kaori simply remained silent, but her golden eyes never stopped scanning the place—the sll, the texture of the soil, the dense energy in the air.
Vergil walked a few more steps, scanning the horizon.
He could feel the power building beneath his feet.
“What about the vaults?” he asked, without looking back. “Did you find anything?”
Selene nodded, looking up. “Yes. We found a Lucifer vault hidden in the Black Mountains. The seal is still active, so we didn’t touch it.”
She gestured with her fingers, and a silver symbol appeared in the air, indicating the exact location on Vergil’s ntal map.
“We recomnd caution. The energy there… is different.”
Vergil smiled, satisfied. “Excellent. I’ll take a look myself.”
Zuri tilted her head, watching him curiously. “Still thinking about naming the territory, master?”
He chuckled softly. “Yes. I’m still thinking about the na.” He paused for a mont, looking up at the crimson sky, where lightning streaked the horizon. “It has to be sothing worthy. Sothing that makes hell tremble when it’s uttered.”
Selene gave a faint smile. “Then it’ll take a while.”
“Probably,” Vergil replied with a half-laugh. “I’m not very good with nas.”
She lowered her gaze, but the smile remained. “Well, not everyone is perfect.”
anwhile, Valerie, Gwen, and Kaori remained behind, trying to appear useful—or at least invisible. But Vergil, as always, noticed everything.
“You three,” he said without turning his head. “You still have a lot to prove.”
The three of them straightened instantly.
“Yes, sir!” they replied in unison.
“For now, stand guard at the eastern border.” His voice was calm, but charged with authority. “I want patrols every three hours. And if anyone—anyone—crosses the border without permission, you will deal with them. Permanently.”
“Understood,” Gwen replied with a firm nod.
The three of them walked away, the sound of their footsteps fading into the rustling of the burning forest.
Vergil turned his gaze to Selene and Zuri, his expression returning to its usual cold, calculated tone.
“Continue stabilizing the borders. I want the territory sealed before nightfall.”
Selene lifted her chin, her silver eyes flashing with mild irritation. Her tone was soft, but filled with restrained venom.
“You know I’m not your servant, right? So stop ordering around, Vergil.”
Zuri glanced at her, surprised by her boldness. The wind seed to catch its breath.
Vergil, however, didn’t respond imdiately. He simply watched her silently, with that calm gaze that always preceded sothing dangerous. After a mont, a small smile curved his lips.
“Hm. It’s true,” he said, his voice low, almost thoughtful. “You’re not really my maid.”
He took a step toward her. The air around them shifted—heavy, dense, charged with an energy that made the ground vibrate.
“But for soone who constantly lies about who she is, you’re complaining too much… don’t you think, liar?”
Selene blinked in surprise. A mont of hesitation crossed her gaze before the coldness returned.
“What… did you say?”
Vergil maintained his smile, though his eyes were now filled with a sharp, almost cruel clarity.
“A demon with divine energy.” He spoke slowly, as if savoring each word. “Do you really think I wouldn’t notice?”
Selene remained still.
“From the mont I last t you, I sensed sothing familiar about you,” Vergil continued, taking another step. “Light and darkness coexisting, yet never canceling each other out… But the divine? I’ve seen it before.”
His voice dropped lower, almost a whisper.
“When I t Aphrodite.”
Selene looked away, her jaw clenched.
Vergil smirked, pleased with the reaction.
“It’s the sa signature. The sa vibration. Sure, different in nature—Aphrodite shines, you consu the light—but still, divine. The essence doesn’t lie. They must be of the sa pantheon, since Wukong is quite different… Olympian? Probably.”
For a mont, the silence was absolute. Only the distant sound of the burning runes and the rustle of the living forest around them.
“So that’s it, Selene,” Vergil concluded, his eyes narrowing. “You can fool demons, humans, maybe even angels… but not .”
He tilted his head slightly, his voice now firm and provocative.
“I just haven’t figured out who you are yet. Your true na… the goddess na you try to hide.”
Selene stood firm, but her breath betrayed a slight tremor. Her eyes narrowed, reflecting an intense, ancient glow—sothing that for a mont seed to transcend ti.
“I’ve left this life behind,” she said, her tone cold, yet almost tremulous. “I don’t want you to keep tied to my past self, who no longer exists.”
Vergil advanced slowly, the sound of his footsteps muffled by the murmur of the runes that still burned beneath the earth. Selene remained still, but her fingers clenched subtly, as if trying to restrain the urge to react.
When he stopped before her, the distance between them was almost nonexistent—enough for her to feel the cold heat of his energy, the echo of sothing neither human nor demonic, but sothing beyond.
Vergil’s eyes stared at her with surgical precision, as if he wanted to pierce her and see what lay behind the mask.
His voice, when it ca, was low and gravelly, a murmur that seed to carry the weight of an inevitable revelation:
“You can hide whatever you want… you can pretend to be whatever you want.
But the truth always finds a way to bleed out, Selene.”
The air grew thicker. The energy between them seed to vibrate, resonating in the ground, in the dead trees, even in the runes that pulsed like hearts.
Vergil tilted his face, his gaze fixed on hers, and added—his tone firm, almost respectful, but filled with a certainty that made her shiver as he leaned close to her ear and murmured:
“In the end, no matter how much ti has passed… You will be mine, when you open up a little… Artemis.”
Instinctively Selene shivered and Vergil smiled. “Oh… looks like I got it right.”
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