The next few Layers of the Abyss did not offer Eden much. Not all Layers had Demon Lords, and some were even completely abandoned. And for those with Demon Lords, none of them were much stronger than Aurnozci.
However, when he reached the 643rd Layer, he sensed something different.
Eden appeared in a cavern, and saw numerous beings fighting one another, dying and experiencing rebirth shortly after. At first sight, it reminded him of the Forgotten Layer, although further observation allowed him to notice a different.
The monsters on this layer were not truly dying. Instead, they were part of a larger rule that had been enforced on this layer, a sort of cycle of death and rebirth. This kind of rule could only be implemented with someone who had completely assimilated their layer.
Even for powerful Demon Lords like Obox-Ox, though they were the lords of their layer, they only had a limited control over it.
This layer was different. The entirety of it had been refined, and become a domain. To be more precise, he was inside the Divine Realm of a god.
A part of Eden knew he should have felt fear, or at least exercised caution. He could feel that the spatial restriction on this layer was weak, so he could easily leave. But he also felt that the owner of this domain was one of his many challengers.
So, he stayed. He did not even have to seek out his challenger himself either.
As expected, the being to whom this layer belonged felt his intrusion instantly, and it only took a moment for them to appear before Eden. It was a voluptuous, four armed woman. She was over twice Eden's height, and though she looked human, her hands ended in claws, she had two large fangs coming out of her mouth, and a third eye on her forehead.
Any arousal he might have felt was instantly killed by her 'clothes', which constituted of a skirt made out of human hands, and a necklace of skulls. Eden had a literally angelic form, and even he was wearing proper clothes.
"Fucking savages," he muttered to himself.
[Name: Kali]
[Title: The Black Earth Mother, Goddess of Destruction, Goddess of Creation, Goddess of Contradictions]
[Talent: ?]
[Perks: Tier III, Limited Magic Immunity I, Godly Regeneration, Power of Destruction III, Godly Technique III, Divine Sight, Domain of Life and Death]
[HP: 2160/2160]
[MP: 950/950]
[Strength: 110]
[Agility: 125]
[Physique: 90]
[Intelligence: 95]
[Wisdom: 90]
[Immunity: Bludgeoning III, Slashing III, Piercing III]
[Resistances: Magical Bludgeoning III, Magical Piercing III, Magical Slashing III]
[Weaknesses: None]
Savage or sage, she was powerful, and he was standing inside her Divine Realm. However, she did not feel so powerful she could easily one-shot him.
Kali looked at him with equal-part curiosity and battle thirst, the two conflicting emotions twisting her face as she asked, "A Solar killed Tharizdun and wants to become Demon King?"
Eden smiled, floating slowly before her. As the Goddess of Contradictions, he was probably extremely interesting. A Solar, a being of good and light, aiming for the throne of Demon King.
Seeing there was a chance to avoid a fight, he did not attack, and asked, "May I know why you challenged my claim? Surely a Goddess would not care about a title like Demon King."
Kali smiled, her hunger for battle rising as she replied, "Fight me. Prove yourself worthy, and I shall acknowledge you."
So much for avoiding a fight.
Unfurling his arms, Eden stared at the goddess. He was pretty much at full MP, as whenever he teleported around the layers of the Abyss, he used Cursed Energy in conjunction to mana to cut through space, so it only cost a fraction of what it should normally cost.
That was not something he could do with his 7th Circle teleportation spell yet, but he did not need it to teleport around the Abyss anyway. Since Kali's Divine Realm did not impose any spatial restrictions, he had simply used 4th Circle magic to come in.
That only cost him about 10 MP, and Eden's current passive regeneration was at about 0.24 MP per second, so that was only 40 seconds to recover from it.
Seeing Kali was set on fighting, Eden chanted, "I cast Avatar of Wrath."
His body transformed, Eden wordlessly rushed at Kali, something she replicated with a grin, all four of her arms swinging her swords at Eden. Each of them encountered a Shield, allowing Eden to get the first hit in, which was reinforced slightly and accompanied by a powerful Cleave.
His punch dealt virtually zero damage, but the Cleave created a gash in her skin, deep enough to draw blood, and the radiant explosion that accompanied his punch seared the wound, while her swords destroyed the magical shields and clashed against Eden's own skin, barely cutting it. Although the Shields had not completely stopped the swords, they had absorbed most of their momentum, and thus damage.
Kali looked shocked she had been injured, and that it did not heal, but that quickly turned into battle craze as she swung her swords once more.
Eden dodged, yet even as the swords missed him, the danger he sensed did not diminish in the slightest, so he reinforced his skin with Cursed Energy. It was just in time as four slashes hit him. Even with the reinforcement, they cut deep into his muscles.
Retreating a bit, Eden thought about what had just happened. The attacks had clearly missed him, and yet, he had still taken damage. Had it not been for his Talent, he would have been caught unaware and probably seriously injured.
How she had done it was obvious to him.
"Using the power of your domain already? That's cheap."
It had been the sure-hit effect of her domain.
Kali ignored his complaints, closing the distance between them in an instant as she resumed her attacks. Once again, dodges were useless.
Although he felt reluctant to activate it so early in their fight, just those four slashes had removed nearly a quarter of his HP, so Eden slapped his hands together, forming the Enma Palm Sign.
"Domain Expansion: Malevolent Shrine."
Kali came to a sudden stop as a gigantic shrine made out of a veritable mountain of corpses suddenly bled into reality. The corpses came in a variety of shapes, and had obviously been taken from a vast variety of beings.
The moment the shrine settled into this reality, a sea of blood expanded outward from it, going a hundred meters in each direction before stopping.
Eden considered himself as having two domains. One was the closed one, which he called O'Yama. The other, similar to Sukuna's, was opened.
Although Eden had given it the same name as Sukuna's Domain Expansion, they were not the exact same, and he had done so more as an homage than a one-to-one similitude. He believed this was because a Domain Expansion was the expression of a person's self, and thus no two domains could be identical.
For example, although Eden called the center of his domain a shrine, it was more of a mountain of skulls, one that lacked the Shinto aesthetic of Sukuna's Shrine. The sea of blood was also something unique to him, and came from all the blood he had shed.
The moment Eden's domain manifested into this reality, he felt Kali's domain fight against it, fight over dominance of this particular piece of space, but unlike with Gorellik and Tharizdun back then, Eden's domain did not instantly lose.
Instead, it crushed her influence over this area of her Divine Realm, establishing itself as the dominant owner of this space, and in an instant, countless invisible slashes caught Kali.
There was no defending from the omnidirectional slashes, and in an instant, she was covered in blood. Much to Eden's surprise though, with a battle cry, a domain of her own burst out of her. It was much more refined, or rather, concentrated than what he had felt before. Apparently, Divine Realms and Domains were different in nature.
Still, while her domain put up a better fight than her Divine Realm had, it was still no match for Eden's, which had been perfected over hundreds of years.
Of course, Kali, as a Goddess, had probably lived for even longer than that, but her domain was clearly not her strong suit. Besides, Eden had forged his own in blood, sweat and tears, while Kali was probably born with hers.
There was simply a qualitative difference between them.
However, the appearance of his domain did not translate into an instant victory for Eden, as it might have with Demon Lords, as Kali's insane regeneration kicked in, keeping up with the domain's attacks.
Kali was the Goddess of Rebirth after all, it made sense for her to have a busted regeneration. Moreover, the slashes were not as powerful as his Maximum Output Cleaves.
Still, she tried to escape from it, so Eden closed in on her, and cast another of his favorite spells. This was the evolution of Strengthened Fireball.
"I cast Starburst."
[Starburst (6th Circle): Launch a bead of concentrated flames up to a distance of 100 (150) meters, exploding it at will to deal 380 (495) fire damage in an explosion that can expend between 10-50 (5-100) meters. Cost: 990 (250) MP.]
Unlike with Shattering Darkness and Maddening Darkness, which he had taken inspiration from, Eden had not liked Meteor Swarm that much as it split damage between fire and bludgeoning. It was good to overcome Resistance and Immunity to fire, but with how common Resistance to non-magical physical damage was in higher Tiers, that was essentially useless. Moreover, Eden preferred pure fire damage.
It was just right for Kali, who had poor defence and no Resistance to fire. Eden set the explosion to its lowest size possible, and since she was inside his domain, his sure-hit effect activated, hitting her squarely as she was suddenly engulfed in a concentrated inferno.
She left the explosion singed, only to find Eden right in her path as he slammed his fist into her belly. There was no Cleave this time, as he used his entire 999 output to reinforce the punch. Moreover, while inside his domain, all of Eden's attributes, spells and Cursed Energy operations were given a boost.
So, with a burst of radiant energy, Kali found herself flung backwards, slamming into the metaphysical Shrine at the center of his Domain Expansion. Eden felt her attempt to teleport her way out, but the spell failed.
[Domain Expansion: Malevolent Shrine (7th Rank): Form a domain with a radius of 100 meters around the activation point, lasting for one minute. While active, everything other than the user is relentlessly attacked by Cleaves and Dismantles two ranks below Maximum Output, stops any form of teleporting out, while the user is boosted by 50% in all manners, all attacks cannot miss, and MP regeneration becomes ten times faster.]
Eden's domain was created through a mix of Mana and Cursed Energy, and thus incorporated his spatial magic.
Kali, who had wanted a fight, had more than met her match. Eden was no puny mortal she could trample under her foot, he was someone capable of actually fighting her. Were it not for the Tier Suppression, Eden's Domain Expansion alone might have killed her.
Although Eden had the Godslayer Perk, Kali was two Tiers above him, meaning he still suffered a 25% reduction on all his attacks.
Yet, despite her current situation, Kali was grinning, battle-lust radiating out of her as she abandoned all attempts to flee. Instead, she fully embraced the situation, and rushed Eden, leaving her natural regeneration handle the domain's relentless attacks.
Eden himself had not recovered from the injuries she had inflicted upon him before he unleashed his domain. Since he had used the radiant version of Avatar of Wrath, while he did hamper her healing, his attacks did nothing to heal him.
The path to victory for both of them was clear now. Kali needed to close in and overpower him through sheer attributes, while Eden needed to hit her enough that her regeneration would be stopped.
So, they clashed.
The edge quickly went to Eden.
While Kali was faster and vastly more skilled than he was, Eden had his Talent's danger sense helping him. And while that only helped him defending, since Kali was inside his domain, even when he missed, he still hit her.
Kali was not a Goddess of Destruction for nothing though, as the more her injuries stacked up, the stronger she seemed to become. Her attacks became faster and stronger, and her defence stronger. But it just was not enough to bridge the gap.
Avatar of Wrath, in its current form, added 370 radiant damage to all of Eden's physical attacks. Since he was inside his domain, that was boosted by 50%, the number thus rising to 555. Adding the 10% from Silver Flame, that was 592. And even with the Tier Suppression, Eden still dealt 444 radiant damage with every hit.
Since every hit dealt 200% healing damage, that made up for a total of 888. Now, stats in Dreamland increased exponentially in value, meaning that Eden was not truly dealing 888 healing damage, so it was mostly theoretical, but it was still high. Eden estimated the real value to be somewhere around 450, maybe 500.
Kali probably had some Perks or Skills acting as countermeasures, but it was not enough.
Eden could not help but wonder whether he actually had a shot at slaying a Goddess in a fair battle.
He became bolder, risking to take attacks to get more hits in. And although Kali started hitting him, all those hits were first weakened by a 1st Circle Shield.
A 1st Circle Shield was capable of blocking 175 damage on paper, and Eden's domain and the Tier Suppression canceled each other, since one boosted the damage by 50% and the other reduced it by the same amount, but adding in Eden's Silver Flame I, each of Eden's Shields blocked a theoretical 193 damage.
Then, Eden's Avatar of Wrath added 175 more defence, and making the same calculation, that added defence was 193 more. Although 193 defence did not block 193 damage, it still reduced damage by a whole lot, and adding in Eden's Physique, which was also boosted by 50%, these attacks ended up as nothing close to deadly.
Each slash that did hit drew blood and cut rather deep into his flesh, but Eden dealt far more damage, and Eden only allowed the attacks he wanted to hit do so, since he was the master of their dance. That was the power of his danger sense.
Soon, Eden managed to Cleave off another of Kali's hands, and a third one quickly followed as her defence was nearly completely shattered. Although she was a master of the sword, she was used to fighting with four arms, not one.
Unfortunately, this state was only temporary, and as Eden managed to bring Kali to a critical point, his Malevolent Shrine ran out, his domain disappearing.
Eden had never been the type of person to truly enjoy battle. While he did find something in finding challenges, the battles themselves always remained secondary. So despite being close to finishing her, his more logical side prevailed as he stopped.
If he knew for sure he could kill her, Eden would not have stopped, but he knew that without his domain, he stood no chance against Kali, even in her current state. He could already see her injuries regenerating fast enough he could see her flesh knitting itself back together.
Eden thought just for a moment of the correct course of action, and ended up stopping in place, placing both hands in the back as he spoke in a measured voice, "I did not come here to slay you."
Pride had been his downfall. The urge to say something stupid, after having fought a god, was strong, but he had learned his lesson. However, there was a fine line between confidence and pride.
His mannerism seemed to cause her to pause, although she might as well have been wasting time to recover. Eden did remark that her regeneration appeared slightly slower than before, even though she was back in her Divine Realm. He wondered whether that was because she had overused it, or if it was because of some residual radiant energy in her body.
Kali's battle-lust receded as she eyed him, considering for a short moment, before dropping, "I yield."
More than accepting her defeat in the fight, she was acknowledging his claim to the title of Demon King.
Eden dipped his head a little in recognition, although if their fight was to truly resume, he would lose in a matter of moments. Since his Domain Expansion had run out, his Innate Technique was practically unusable, and his mana was not much better.
That was the downside of using both Mana and Cursed Energy for his Domain Expansion. While it meant every aspect of him would be enhanced, and the Domain was stronger, it also meant that when it ran out, everything would be burnt.
In his current condition, Eden would only be able to reinforce himself with Cursed Energy, as it took no Innate Technique to do so, and anything above a 4th Circle spell would be impossible.
So still enough to flee, but not so much to continue fighting.
Eden gave her a last look, before disappearing into one of his demiplanes to recover.