The battlefield.
Lucion stood there menacingly.
Sona had left a few moments ago to try and escape the anti-communication barrier.
The silence before the storm lasted a few seconds as Toshio used Observe.
{Name: Lucion, Prince of Hatred
Level: 666
Threat Level: SSS
Descriptive Insight: Son of Mephisto, he is an incredibly powerful demon seeking to bring about the destruction of all races to rule every realm. WARNING: EXTREMELY DANGEROUS.}
Toshio didn't have time to gawk as a voice interrupted his thoughts.
"GIVE ME BACK MY MOTHER!" Kunou's voice tore across the clearing, raw with desperation and fury. The young princess broke formation, her small form racing forward before her bodyguards could react.
Lucion didn't even look at her, his eyes looking toward Serafall.
His hand moved with casual indifference, a sphere of concentrated demonic energy materializing and launching toward the charging kitsune. The attack moved faster than Kunou could track, faster than her young body could possibly evade.
Time seemed to slow. Kunou saw the sphere approaching, saw death written in its crimson glow, and her mind went blank with the certainty that she'd failed before even beginning.
A wall of ice erupted between Kunou and oblivion.
Serafall materialized in front of the young princess, one hand raised as crystalline barriers layered themselves in rapid succession. The demonic sphere slammed into the ice with enough force to shatter the first three layers, cracks spiderwebbing across the fourth before the attack finally dissipated.
"Stay. Back." Serafall's voice carried none of its usual playfulness. The Maou's eyes had gone cold, her aura flooding the clearing with pressure that made even the yokai warriors take an involuntary step backward.
Lucion finally turned his full attention to her, his expression one of mild interest rather than concern. "Serafall Leviathan. One of the so-called Maou who inherited titles they never earned." His voice dripped with contempt. "Tell me, how does it feel to play at leadership while standing on the corpses of those who came before you?"
"Better than standing on the corpses of innocents," Serafall shot back, her hand already forming spell patterns in the air. "And that's Magical Girl Levia-tan to you." Toshio couldn't help but crack a smirk at the unserious statement spoken with the utmost serious tone.
Lucion's laugh was cold and mirthless. "Innocents? Is that what you call the yokai? The devils? You're all the same—parasites feeding on power you don't understand nor deserve, building civilizations on foundations of sand."
He took a single step forward, and the pressure in the clearing intensified. Toshio felt it like a physical weight, his Energy Sense screaming warnings as Lucion's power signature expanded to fill the space around them.
"True demons built the underworld," Lucion continued, his voice carrying to every warrior present. "We shaped reality itself with our will, conquered realms beyond your comprehension, and ruled with the strength that only absolute power can provide. Then you devils—you pathetic imitations—stole our legacy, diluted our bloodlines, and called yourselves rulers."
His eyes swept across the assembled forces, and Toshio saw genuine hatred burning in their depths.
"But that ends today. We will reclaim what was stolen. We will purge the weak and the pretenders. And we will remind this world what true power looks like."
"You done with your villain monologue?" Serafall's voice cut through his speech. "Because I've got two thousand warriors here who'd love to show you what 'weak pretenders' can do."
Lucion smiled, and it was the most terrifying expression Toshio had ever seen on a humanoid face.
"By all means." The demon lord turned and began walking toward the cave entrance. "Show me."
He disappeared into the darkness of the cave, and for a moment, nothing happened.
Then the ground began to shake.
It started as a tremor, barely noticeable beneath their feet. Within seconds it had grown to a violent quaking that sent rocks tumbling down the mountainside and forced warriors to brace themselves for balance.
The earth directly in front of the cave entrance cracked. The fissures spread rapidly, branching out in jagged patterns that glowed with sickly red light. Stone crumbled and fell away, revealing a massive hollow space beneath the mountain's surface.
The ground collapsed inward, forming a crude ramp that descended into depths no natural cave system should possess. Red light pulsed from below, rhythmic and terrible, like the heartbeat of something vast and malevolent.
Then they came.
Demons poured from the underground like water from a broken dam. Hundreds of them in the first wave—demonic goatmen with glowing red eyes, demon troopers with large maces, demonic hellflyers of varying colors and sizes, blue and red fallen with their shamans and overseers, huge mallet lords that had no business being underground, morlu legionnaires with various weapons, and hulking demonic oppressors with red skin and bone wings. They surged up the ramp in an endless tide, their collective roars shaking the air itself.
"Tenkō's mercy," the yokai scout leader breathed beside Toshio. "That's... that's at least three thousand. Maybe more. We estimated five hundred at most."
The acting general of the yokai forces—a massive oni with skin like granite and a tetsubo the size of a tree trunk—stepped forward. His voice boomed across the formation, cutting through the rising panic.
"YOKAI OF THE WEST! YOKAI OF THE EAST!" He raised his tetsubo high, unique yokai energy crackling along its surface. "TODAY WE FIGHT FOR OUR LADY! TODAY WE FIGHT FOR OUR LAND! TODAY WE SHOW THESE DEMON SCUM WHAT HAPPENS WHEN THEY THREATEN WHAT IS OURS!"
A roar answered him—two thousand voices raised in defiance and fury. The yokai formation shifted, warriors moving into combat positions with practiced efficiency. Blades were drawn, claws extended, and spiritual energy flooded through bodies as various spiritual magics and enhancements were activated across the entire force.
"FOR YASAKA-SAMA!" The general charged, his massive form covering ground with surprising speed.
"FOR YASAKA-SAMA!" Two thousand yokai surged forward as one, meeting the demon tide head-on.
The battlefield exploded into chaos.
Toshio drew Shinjūka, the sealed zanpakutō humming with anticipation in his grip. Around him, Rias's peerage moved into formation—Akeno's hands already crackling with lightning, Kiba manifesting a sword in each hand, Rias herself gathering crimson destruction energy between her palms.
"Stay close," Toshio said, his enhanced senses tracking dozens of threats simultaneously. "Don't let yourselves get separated."
They plunged into the melee.
The yokai were winning. Despite being outnumbered, their superior strength and centuries of combat experience showed immediately. Toshio watched as a kitsune warrior carved through three demons with precise strikes, each movement economical and deadly. An oni brought his kanabo down with enough force to pulverize five demons simultaneously, their bodies exploding into gore.
The yokai fought with discipline and coordination, their formations holding strong even in the chaos. They covered each other's flanks, called out warnings, and rotated positions to prevent fatigue.
The demons, by contrast, fought with savage aggression but little tactical sense. They threw themselves at the yokai lines with suicidal abandon, relying on numbers and raw ferocity rather than skill.
For the first five minutes, it looked like a massacre in the yokai's favor.
Then everything changed.
Four figures emerged from the demon ranks, and the pressure they radiated made every warrior on the battlefield instinctively recoil. These weren't cannon fodder—these were likely Lucion's lieutenants.
The Blood Knight stood tall, his crimson full-plate armor seeming to absorb light rather than reflect it. Power rolled off him in waves that made the air itself feel heavy. Beside him, Astaroth's large demonic form with features twisted into a contemptuous sneer as he surveyed the battlefield. Two others flanked them—demons whose forms shifted and changed, making them difficult to focus on directly.
The tide of battle shifted immediately. Wherever the lieutenants moved, yokai died. The Blood Knight's massive sword cleaved through three warriors with a single swing, their spiritual reinforcement offering no protection against the corrupted blade. Astaroth moved with supernatural speed, his clawed hands punching through reinforced bodies like they were paper.
Serafall saw the shift and reacted instantly. Ice magic flooded from her hands, creating a frozen path through the demon ranks as she carved toward the cave entrance. Demons shattered as she passed, their bodies flash-frozen and obliterated by follow-up strikes.
She was halfway to the cave when Lucion reappeared.
He didn't attack immediately. He simply stood in her path, and his presence alone brought Serafall's charge to a halt. The Maou and the demon lord faced each other across ten meters of frozen corpses, power gathering around both of them in visible distortions.
"Shall we?" Lucion's voice was almost polite.
Serafall's response was a lance of concentrated ice magic that could have pierced a mountain. Lucion deflected it with a casual gesture, and then they were both moving, their battle instantly escalating to speeds that made them blur in Toshio's enhanced perception.
The shockwave from their first true exchange sent warriors flying on both sides, forcing everyone nearby to retreat or be caught in the crossfire.
Toshio forced his attention away from the Maou's battle. He had his own problems.
Rias, Akeno, and Kiba had carved a path through the demon forces with devastating efficiency. Rias's Power of Destruction simply erased anything it touched, creating gaps in the enemy formation that the others exploited ruthlessly. Akeno's lightning danced between targets, frying all demons who encountered it. Kiba moved like water, his twin swords finding weak points with surgical precision.
Their killing efficiency was quickly noticed by Astaroth.
The demon lieutenant disengaged from the yokai he'd been slaughtering and turned his attention toward Rias's group. His lips curved into something that might have been a smile if there'd been any warmth in it.
"Well, well," Astaroth's voice carried across the battlefield despite the chaos. "The Gremory heiress. And the Himejima bastard. How delightful." Toshio used Observe.
{Name: Astaroth, The Charred Duke
Level: 197
Threat Level: S+
Descriptive Insight: A powerful demon wielding great strength and fire magic; he is one of Mephisto's most trusted lieutenants, now serving Mephisto's son in Mephisto's current absence.}
He moved, and Toshio's enhanced senses tracked the motion. One moment Astaroth stood thirty meters away, the next he was in the middle of Rias's formation, his clawed hand already swinging toward Akeno's exposed back.
Kiba intercepted, both swords coming up in a desperate block. The impact sent him skidding backward, his feet carving furrows in the blood-soaked ground.
"Oh, and a failed experiment," Astaroth said, examining Kiba with mock interest. "Tell me, boy, do you still dream of your dead friends? Do their screams keep you awake at night?"
Kiba's face went pale, then flushed with rage. He charged, swords moving in patterns too fast for normal eyes to follow.
Astaroth dodged every strike without apparent effort, his movements casual and contemptuous. "Pathetic. Is this really the best the new generation can offer?"
Rias fired a blast of destruction energy. Astaroth simply stepped aside, letting it obliterate the demons behind him.
"Better," he acknowledged. "But still—"
Lightning struck from above, Akeno's most powerful attack channeled directly at the demon's head. Astaroth raised one hand, and the lightning simply stopped, crackling against an invisible barrier before dissipating harmlessly.
"Disappointing," he finished.
Toshio moved to assist them, Shinjūka at the ready as he prepared to engage. He made it three steps before something massive slammed into his path.
The Blood Knight stood before him.
"I think not, puny human." Toshio jumped back to gather distance. "I heard you dealt with those elite morlus. Impressive, considering you're just a human. I think I'll give myself the honor of slaughtering you." Its tone was deep and monotone, lacking any kind of emotion. Yet, Toshio could feel the killing intent rolling off the giant armored knight.
Toshio didn't need to wait.
"Unchain the repressed, Shinjūka." A burst of power flowed from him, his sword changing forms. Toshio noticed Rias and her group seemed to holding their own against the other demon lieutenant, so he put his full focus on the fight ahead. He had a feeling he was going to need it.
Observe revealed troubling information.
{Name: Demonic Blood Knight
Level: 213
Threat Level: SS-
Descriptive Insight: Once human, this powerful demon wears armor that is resistant to magic and physical attacks. He wields excellent swordsmanship to slay his enemies.}
Toshio was surprised to see that this lieutenant was stronger than Astaroth. He was also eager to test his own swordsmanship against this foe.
Toshio launched toward the knight with shikai-enhanced runic shunpo.
Toshio's blade met the Blood Knight's massive corrupted sword with a sound like thunder splitting stone. The impact sent shockwaves rippling outward, forcing nearby combatants to stagger away from the dueling pair.
The Blood Knight's strength was immense. Toshio felt the force of the block travel through Shinjūka's blade and into his arms, his enhanced physique the only thing preventing his bones from shattering. He disengaged immediately, using runic shunpo to create distance.
The knight pursued without hesitation, his armor clanking with each ground-eating stride. Despite the bulk, his movements were fluid and precise. The massive sword came down in an overhead strike that would have bisected Toshio if it had connected.
Toshio sidestepped, letting the blade cleave through the earth where he'd stood a moment before. The impact created a crater three feet deep, with dirt and rocks exploding outward from the force.
He countered with a horizontal slash aimed at the knight's exposed side. Shinjūka's edge, enhanced by his shikai, should have carved through the armor.
The blade connected with a screech of metal on metal. Sparks flew, but when Toshio pulled back, the armor showed only a shallow scratch.
The knight's response was immediate—a backhanded swing that forced Toshio to duck, the corrupted blade passing inches above his head. Toshio rolled forward, coming up inside the knight's guard, and drove Shinjūka toward the gap between breastplate and helmet.
The knight twisted, armor plates shifting to protect the vulnerable point. Toshio's thrust scraped harmlessly across the crimson metal.
They separated again, circling each other as the battle raged around them. Toshio's mind raced through tactical calculations. Physical attacks weren't working—the armor was too resilient. He needed to try something different.
"Yūgō: Tier 3—Acetylene Annihilation!" Blue-white fire erupted from the top of Toshio's blade, the destructive spell streaking toward the Knight's center mass.
The Blood Knight didn't dodge. He walked through the flames, his armor absorbing the magical assault without visible damage. The fire washed over him like water over stone, dissipating harmlessly.
Toshio gritted his teeth. The armor's magic resistance had to be annoyingly high to not even receive damage from that.
The Knight closed the distance with surprising speed, his sword coming in a series of strikes that forced Toshio into pure defense. Each blow was calculated and precise, targeting vital points with the skill of a master swordsman. Toshio parried and dodged, his enhanced perception the only thing keeping him alive.
A thrust aimed at his heart. Toshio deflected it, the tip grazing his shoulder instead. A horizontal slash toward his neck. He ducked under it, feeling the air pressure from the blade's passage. An upward cut meant to disembowel. He backstepped, the edge missing by centimeters.
The Knight was skilled—probably more skilled than Toshio in pure technique. Only his shikai-enhanced speed and reactions kept him competitive.
Toshio needed to change the dynamic of the fight.
He gathered reiryoku and focused it down the edge of Shinjuka, black and red energy sparking out from it.
"Yūgō: Incomplete Cero!"
The beam of compressed spiritual energy burst forth, smaller and less stable than a true cero but still devastating. It struck the Blood Knight square in the chest, the force driving him backward three steps.
When the energy dissipated, the knight's armor showed scorch marks but no significant damage. The demon tilted his head slightly, as if evaluating this new threat level.
"Interesting," the knight's monotone voice rumbled. "But insufficient."
He charged again, and this time his strikes came faster. Toshio parried desperately, each impact sending vibrations through his arms. The Knight was testing him, pushing to find his limits.
Toshio needed breathing room. He channeled magic through Shinjūka, letting the blade's unique ability enhance the spell's effect.
"Yūgō: Tier 3: Lightning Bolt—Multiple Casting!"
The air around Toshio's opponent lit up with instant magic circles and exploded with electricity. Not one bolt, but fifty simultaneous strikes, each one targeting the Blood Knight from a different angle like a dome of static. The Multiple Casting skill at rank 5 allowed Toshio to cast the same spell 50 times, in this case creating a storm of magical lightning that should have fried anything within the sphere of lightning.
Metal was conductive, so this had a chance to work, right?
The knight's armor lit up like a beacon as electricity coursed over its surface. Thunder cracked and rolled, the sound deafening. The ground beneath the demon's feet turned to glass from the heat.
When the barrage ended, steam rose from the Blood Knight's armor. The metal glowed faintly red from the accumulated energy. But he still stood, apparently unfazed.
"Your magic is strong," the Knight acknowledged, taking a step forward. "But my armor was forged in the deepest pits of the underworld, enhanced by my own power. It has withstood worse."
He attacked again, and Toshio realized with growing concern that the Knight wasn't tiring. No heavy breathing, no slowing of movements. The armor seemed to provide endless endurance.
A massive overhead strike came down with enough force to crater stone. Toshio knew he couldn't block it directly—the impact would break his guard and leave him vulnerable.
"Tier 4: Hardlight Barrier!"
A shimmering rectangle of solid light materialized between Toshio and the descending blade—two feet by four feet of crystalline energy that hummed with contained power. The knight's sword struck it dead center.
The barrier held for exactly one second before shattering like glass. But that second was enough. Toshio used runic shunpo to appear behind the Knight, Shinjuka piercing through the air aimed at a chink in the ridiculously powerful armor.
Moving with unnatural speed and flexibility, the knight blocked Toshio's sword point with the flat of his blade, then spun with a horizontal strike.
Too fast!
With not enough time to dodge, Toshio hastily cast 10 hardlight barriers, all of which were shattered, but gave him time to block and brace with his own blade. The blades collided.
Toshio widened his eyes at the strength of it, smacking him to the side, causing him to tumble across the blood-soaked ground.
Toshio recovered quickly and crouched into a fighting position, feet skidding across the ground. He was getting a little worried. He only had a few things left he could try.
"For a human, you have an awfully devil-like physique. Skills too. It's only because my desire to butcher you is a bit less than those other devils that really confirms that you're still human." Toshio, ready to attack again, paused, along with everyone else on the battlefield, to look toward the mouth of the cave.
A huge surge of demonic energy washed over the battlefield as a tower of ice formed, hundreds of feet tall, the sounds of glaciers being crushed quickly following as the ice was shattered. Serafall.
Toshio hoped her battle wouldn't cause too much collateral. Tearing his gaze away from the spectacle of power, he refocused on his own battle.
Over by Serafall, Lucion looked upon her with an amused sneer. "Such puny power has no chance of harming me, imitator." Serafall looked upon him solemnly. She knew she was probably going to have to go all out to beat this monster. But the only way to fight him freely was to trap him in a subspace barrier. A barrier that can be seen through but created a void space that essentially isolated everything within in its own type of dimension.
Her strongest type of barrier. Barriers weren't her forte after all. Magic gathered around her, saturating the space around her until the air molecules warped and imploded.
"That's better, but not quick enough." Lucion, with a wave of his hand, caused the blood on the battlefield to crystalize and form into countless spikes, all tearing a path toward the maou faster than most beings could even track. The spikes struck home but were held back by the strange distortion around Serafall.
"This isn't for you." Then the warped air expanded out, shattering the blood spikes into dust until a large dome formed around the both of them. "It's for us."
Lucion appeared by the edge of and touched the barrier. "A void barrier. Only the weak care about collateral."
"Maybe. Now let me show you what this magical girl can do." With a heavy glare, Serafall pointed her magical girl wand at her opponent.
"Celsius Cross Trigger." In an instant, every surface with the barrier turned to ice so cold it could snap-freeze entire oceans.
Lucion stood on what appeared to be a platform made of blood, a sphere of blood behind him forming in that same instant. That blood, however, began to frost over.
"Hmm. So this is your power. Looks like I'll have to try a bit." Power surged around Lucion, the blood boiling behind him.
"Let's see how you handle this, devil." Lucion raised his hand. "Magma Blood."
The blood sphere behind him burst into light, almost as bright as the sun, melting all of the ice on his half of the barrier sphere.
Serafall knew other forms of magic, but ice was definitely her specialty, and none of her magic was as powerful as that kind of magic. However, Lucion appeared to counter her with his style of magic.
"Such a hot-blooded male, thinking you can take on this Magical Ice Girl. Guess I'll have to cool you off!"
Millions of ice bullets the size of artillery shells formed behind Serafall. With a dramatic forward slash of her wand, they fired toward the demon lord easily 100 times faster than the speed of sound (~34,000 m/s). The sound of one million projectiles breaking the sound barrier to such a degree would have ruptured the eardrums of every being on the battlefield. But by design, the barrier also blocked sound.
"Blood wall." A massive wall of magma blood formed instantly in front of Lucion, blocking the bombardment. The explosion of kinetic force detonated against the barrier, creating an explosion that would have been miles wide, a borderline nuclear attack.
In retaliation, Lucion twisted and clenched his fist.
"Blood sun." The ball of blood behind him pulsed and then shrunk, creating its own gravitational pull.
"Sanguine comet." The ball of destruction burst through the melting wall, traveling twice as fast as Serafall's artillery shells. She widened her eyes in alarm.
The densest ice imaginable formed a solid block in front of her, over 100 feet long. The bloody comet of destruction cut through this defense as if it weren't even there. Serafall, using every bit of her strength, dodged. She couldn't block it, but her ice gave her the precious few milliseconds she needed to move out of the way.
The gravitational ball came within a foot of her body, incinerating the entire left side of her magical girl outfit. Third-degree burns formed on her left hand and forearm, the skin that was closest to the streaking celestial attack. Not bothered by her revealed body, she simply looked down at her form.
"...my magical girl outfit." Her eyes exploded in icy fury. The magic aura around her grew denser than Lucion would have expected from the Satan.
"Magical girl Levia-tan is gone now." Her voice was low but reverberated throughout the barrier.
"You now face Serafall Leviathan, SATAN OF THE UNDERWORLD!" All sounds were silenced until her next words.
"Absolute Zero."