"Glad he's gone."
Ren Ming's voice cut through the suffocating silence of the Occult Research Club like a serrated knife. He stood amidst the wreckage of the entrance, casually dusting plaster and wood chips off his loose white t-shirt. The air still tasted of ozone and the metallic tang of Riser's blood, but Ren looked as though he had just finished a mild jog rather than humiliating a High-Class Devil.
He reached into the pocket of his grey sweatpants, retrieving a folded piece of standard A4 printer paper and a small, crumpled talisman. With a flick of his wrist that was almost too fast to track, he tossed them onto Rias Gremory's mahogany desk. They landed with a soft slap that echoed louder than a gunshot in the tense room.
"You guys are weak," Ren stated. It wasn't an insult; it was a clinical observation, delivered with the bluntness of a sledgehammer. "Like, actually painful to watch. You rely on your bloodlines, your fancy little chess pieces, and your family names, but you don't understand the first thing about actual power."
Rias stared at the paper, her breath hitching. The Crimson-Haired Ruin Princess, usually the picture of nobility, looked bewildered. "What... is this?"
"A cheat sheet," Ren replied, scratching the back of his neck. "Call it a perfect fix for a broken system. It's a path to stop being a pawn on someone else's board. Read it. If you can understand even one percent of the concepts in there, you'll be stronger than that arrogant prick in a week."
He turned on his heel, his sneakers squeaking slightly on the debris-strewn floor, and began walking toward the gaping hole that used to be the double doors.
"Wait!" Issei Hyoudou's voice cracked as he shouted, stepping forward despite his trembling legs. "Why? Why help us? You just... you just beat Riser like he was nothing! Why give us this?"
Ren Ming stopped. He didn't turn his body, just glanced back over his shoulder. His grey eyes, usually deep pools of indifference, held a spark of amusement. He smirked—not a villainous sneer, but the confident, borderline arrogant grin of a man who knows he holds all the cards.
"Because why not?" Ren Ming shrugged. "And because you guys have potential. Stupid, messy, untapped potential. Just pour your energy into the talisman if you want to actually control your lives. Or don't. Stay weak. Marry the flaming dumbass and live a life of regret. No skin off my back."
His gaze drifted to Akeno Himejima. The Queen of the Gremory peerage was staring at him, her usual 'Ara Ara' mask completely stripped away, revealing raw awe.
Ren Ming faintly smiled. "Nice ponytail, by the way. Suits you."
Then, he moved.
There was no magical circle. No gathering of light. No tear in space-time. Ren Ming simply applied force to the ground and vanished. The displacement of air was so violent it created a vacuum; papers flew off the desks, and the curtains whipped wildly as a sonic boom cracked through the room a split second after he was already gone.
"What... just happened?" Koneko Toujou whispered, her cat-like pupils fully dilated. Her instincts, usually sharp enough to track anything, had registered nothing but a blur.
Grayfia Lucifuge, the strongest Queen in the Underworld, stared at the empty doorway. Her hands, clasped in front of her pristine maid uniform, were shaking. It was a subtle tremor, invisible to most, but to those who knew her, it was terrifying.
"I... I do not know," Grayfia admitted, her voice uncharacteristically hollow. "But that man... he is not of this world."
The silence that followed was heavier than the gravity spell Ren had utilized earlier. It was a dense, suffocating quiet born of realizing just how small they were in the grand scheme of things.
Rias stared at the empty space where the "passing cultivator" had stood. Her hands were trembling uncontrollably. She looked down at the desk. There, innocent and unassuming, lay the single sheet of printer paper.
The Myriad Origin Scripture.
It looked like homework. It felt like salvation.
Rias took a shaky breath, her hand reaching out. Desperation was a physical ache in her chest, a clawing beast demanding a solution. She had ten days. Ten days before her life ended and she became a trophy wife for Riser Phenex. This anomaly, this monster in sweatpants, had offered her a lifeline.
"Rias-sama. Do not touch that."
The command was sharp, cold, and absolute. Grayfia stepped forward, the hem of her uniform swishing with military precision. The temperature in the room plummeted ten degrees instantly, frost creeping across the windows.
Rias froze, her fingers inches from the paper. "Grayfia... he helped us. He stopped Riser."
"He humiliated a High-Class Devil of the Phenex Clan and exerted a physical pressure that defies logic," Grayfia stated, her eyes narrowing as she fixated on the paper as if it were a dormant nuclear warhead. "He utilized no Magic. No Senjutsu. No Touki. I analyzed him the moment he entered. To my senses, he was a void. A blank space in reality. And yet, he crushed Riser with a stomp."
Grayfia maneuvered around the desk, placing her body physically between Rias and the document. "We do not know his allegiance. We do not know his species. This 'scripture' could be a curse. It could be a memetic hazard designed to enslave your peerage or corrupt your Evil Pieces entirely."
"But what choice do I have?!" Rias snapped, the dam finally breaking. Tears pricked the corners of her eyes, hot and angry. She stood up, slamming her hands on the desk. "You saw Riser! You know the power gap! Even with a strategy, my peerage is young! Issei and Asia have been devils for weeks! If I don't take a risk, I belong to him!"
The outburst echoed in the ruined room. Issei clenched his fist so hard his nails dug into his palm. "Dammit..."
Grayfia's expression softened, just a fraction. It was the microscopic crack in the mask of the Ultimate Queen. She looked at Rias—the girl she had watched grow up, the sister of the man she loved—and sighed.
"I understand your desperation, Rias-sama. Truly." Grayfia reached out, her hand glowing with a complex array of silver magic circles—defensive scanning spells of the highest order, layered with Maou-class barriers. She carefully, delicately picked up the paper.
"However, I cannot allow the sister of Lucifer to practice an unknown art from an unidentified entity without vetting," Grayfia declared. She looked down at the text. "This calligraphy... it is disturbing. The characters seem to shift when I look at them, as if the ink is alive."
She turned to Rias, her authority returning in full force. "I will take this. I will transport it immediately to Sirzechs-sama. If the Maou determines it is safe—and only if he determines it is safe—will it be returned to you."
Rias opened her mouth to argue, but the genuine fear in Grayfia's eyes stopped her. It wasn't just strictness; it was protection. Grayfia, the Silver-Haired Queen of Annihilation, was terrified that Rias might accidentally blow her soul apart by reading the first sentence.
"Fine," Rias whispered, slumping back into her chair, defeated. "But please... hurry. We don't have time."
"I will return within the hour," Grayfia promised. She turned to the rest of the peerage. "Clean this mess up. Fix the door. And do not speak of Ren Ming to anyone outside this room until we understand what we are dealing with."
With a flash of silver light and a swirl of ice crystals, the Strongest Queen vanished, taking the Myriad Origin Scripture to the depths of the Underworld.
Rias put her head in her hands. Akeno walked over, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder.
"Ara ara, Rias," Akeno said softly, though her usual playfulness was dampened by shock. "That man... Ren Ming. He was quite... intense. But he did say we had potential."
"He called us trash," Issei muttered, picking himself up and kicking a piece of debris. "But... he also gave us a chance. I don't know why, but I kinda believe him. He didn't feel like a bad guy. Just... really, really arrogant."
"He's not arrogant, Issei," Kiba said quietly, staring at the spiderweb cracks in the floor where Ren had stomped. "Arrogance is thinking you're above others when you aren't. That man... he simply knows he is."
....
The Outskirts of Kuoh
While the devils panicked, Ren Ming was calmly meditating on a hill overlooking the town, humming a tune that wouldn't be released on Spotify for another five years.
The night air was cool, but to his Ancient Ming Bloodline, it felt like an appetizer. The ambient mana in the human world was thin, watery—like skim milk when he craved a protein shake. He had already fully digested the holy energy he'd ripped from Freed Sellzen, and his four Fate Palaces were humming at a comfortable capacity.
The encounter with Riser had been satisfying in a petty, visceral way—like popping a Zit—but it hadn't scratched the itch. He needed resources. He needed density. Rias and her crew were investments; you don't eat your seeds, you water them.
'I need a real challenge,' Ren mused, opening his eyes.
He had a clear estimation of his base prowess now. Grayfia Lucifuge, a woman comparable to Maou-class devils, hadn't even registered as a threat to his instincts. That meant he could aim higher. Much higher.
He needed something wild. Something ancient.
His Immortal Soul Bone hummed at the base of his skull. It activated, turning the chaotic noise of the world into a stream of legible data. He pushed his senses outward, bypassing the weak signatures of stray devils and minor spirits, searching for a singularity.
Ping.
[Detection: High-density Draconian Chaos Energy source. Location: Deep within the Familiar Forest.]
Ren grinned, a look of absolute delight spreading across his face. His grey eyes swirled with a predatory light that would have made a normal human faint.
"She's here. Perfect."
He recalled the light novels. Tiamat. The Karma Dragon King. The strongest of the Five Dragon Kings, stronger even than Tannin. She was a powerhouse who loathed Ddraig, and by extension, was likely sulking in the Familiar Forest, waiting for a chance to kill the Red Dragon Emperor.
"Five Dragon Kings? More like five potential generals," Ren chuckled.
He didn't run. He didn't use magic. He simply applied force. The pavement beneath his cheap sneakers pulverized into dust, and he vanished from the hillside, leaving only a shockwave in his wake.
....
The Familiar Forest
The Familiar Forest was a chaotic realm, a pocket dimension layered over the mortal world where magical beasts roamed freely. It was a place of survival, usually filled with the sounds of predation and territory disputes.
Tonight, however, the forest was dead silent. The lesser beasts—the sprites, the weird slimes, the oversized wolves—were cowering in their burrows.
In a clearing near a crystalline lake that reflected the twin moons of the Underworld, a woman stood.
She was stunning. Her long, flowing hair was the color of deep glacial ice, and her eyes held the vertical slits of a reptile. She wore a dress that seemed woven from shadows and blue dragon scales, hugging a figure that was voluptuous enough to make a saint sin.
Tiamat. The Chaos Karma Dragon King.
She was agitated. The water of the lake rippled in time with her annoyance. She had felt a ripple earlier—a burst of strange, grey energy like nothing she had ever encountered in her thousands of years of life. It wasn't Devil, Angel, or Fallen. It felt archaic. Old. Hungry.
"Come out," Tiamat hissed, her voice vibrating with a power that caused the leaves to tremble. "I can smell you. You reek of... otherness."
"Sheesh, 'reek' is a strong word, lady. I showered this morning. Used that fancy body wash and everything."
Tiamat spun around, her claws extending instantly, carving deep grooves into the air itself.
Ren Ming was leaning against a massive oak tree on the edge of the clearing, looking completely at ease. He was digging his pinky finger into his ear, looking bored.
"Who are you?" Tiamat demanded, her aura flaring. The pressure she released was immense—enough to crush a High-Class Devil into paste. The trees around her groaned and bent away from her.
Ren didn't even blink. He pushed off the tree and walked toward her, hands in his pockets.
"Ren Ming," he said. "Just a guy. You know, I was expecting a big, scaly lizard, but I got a blue-haired beauty instead. Not complaining. Definitely an upgrade. 10 out of 10 would view again."
Tiamat's eyes narrowed into dangerous slits. "Insolence. You dare speak to the Chaos Karma Dragon with such disrespect? You enter my territory, human?"
"Territory?" Ren looked around, feigning confusion. "I don't see a fence. I don't see a 'Keep Out' sign. I just see a nice spot for a late-night walk. Plus, I sensed some serious energy over here. Thought I'd check if it was spicy."
"You seek death," Tiamat growled.
She raised her hand. A massive sphere of swirling blue fire materialized above her palm. This wasn't normal fire; it was Chaos Energy. It crackled with instability, warping the space around it, promising to rewrite the existence of anything it touched.
"Begone!"
She hurled the chaos sphere at him. It moved faster than sound, tearing a trench through the ground as it flew, vaporizing the soil instantly.
Ren yawned.
He raised his right hand. His skin shimmered with a faint, grey luster—the activation of the Hell Suppressing Immortal Physique.
BOOM.
The explosion was catastrophic. A mushroom cloud of blue fire rose into the night sky, incinerating the trees in a fifty-meter radius. The lake water boiled instantly, sending plumes of steam into the air.
Tiamat lowered her hand, scoffing. "Foolish human. Ashes to ashes."
"Yo, that was warm. Do you have a setting for 'hot'?"
Tiamat's eyes widened to the size of dinner plates.
As the smoke cleared, Ren Ming was standing exactly where he had been. He wasn't burnt. His cheap white t-shirt wasn't even singed. He was casually dusting off his shoulder as if he had walked through a cobweb.
"How..." Tiamat took a step back, her draconian instincts screaming DANGER. "That was a breath of the Dragon King. No human could survive that."
"I told the priest guy earlier, and I'll tell you," Ren said, walking through the scorching crater, the molten earth cooling rapidly under his feet. "I'm built different. Your energy... it's chaotic, right? Messy. Hard to control."
He stopped a few feet from her. The height difference was noticeable; he towered over her human form.
"My bloodline," Ren tapped his chest, referencing the Ancient Ming Bloodline. "It loves chaos. It eats chaos. You're basically throwing a steak at a starving lion and expecting the lion to get hurt."
Tiamat gritted her teeth.
The sheer audacity!
She was a Dragon King!
She was one of the Five Great Dragon Kings!
She would not be mocked by a hairless ape in sweatpants!
"I WILL NOT BE MOCKED!"
She transformed.
Her human guise shattered like glass. In an instant, the clearing was filled by a massive blue dragon, thirty meters tall, scales shimmering with the chaotic light of the Tiamat. Her roar shattered the sound barrier, flattening the forest for miles and sending birds fleeing in terror three towns over.
"DIE, TINY THING!"
She slammed a claw the size of a city bus down onto him.
Ren looked up, his grey eyes shining with genuine excitement. He had already erected a barrier around the area to contain the damage—he didn't want the supernatural police showing up just yet.
He surged a fraction of his bloodline. His blood energy roared like a tsunami inside his veins.
"Okay, now we're talking. Big Monster Mode? I dig it."
He didn't dodge. He caught the claw.
With two hands.
The impact was deafening. The ground beneath Ren vaporized, creating a crater twenty meters deep. But Ren Ming stood firm, his muscles coiling, holding back the weight of thousands of tons of draconian muscle and kinetic energy with sheer physical strength.
"Nngh," Ren grunted, a savage grin spreading across his face. "You've got some grip strength, Blue. I like a woman who can wrestle."
"IMPOSSIBLE!" Tiamat roared, pushing down with all her might, her eyes wide with disbelief. "WHAT ARE YOU?!"
"I'm the guy asking for your number!" Ren shouted back.
He shifted his stance. "And I'm also the guy who's gonna show you who's on top!"
Ren Ming released a burst of the Petrifying Immortal Light from his aura. He didn't aim to petrify her completely—that would be a waste—but to weigh her down conceptually. The grey light washed over Tiamat's massive form.
Instantly, Tiamat felt her movements become sluggish. Her scales felt like lead. The complexity of her dragon physiology was being suppressed by the Immortal Soul Bone's conceptual dominance.
Ren seized the opportunity. He grabbed one of her massive talons, spun on his heel, and heaved.
He threw a thirty-meter dragon.
Tiamat shrieked—a sound of pure confusion and terror—as she was launched into the air. She arced through the sky like a ragdoll, crashing into a nearby mountain with a force that would have registered as a 5.0 earthquake across the entire forest if not for Ren's barrier.
CRASH.
Rocks shattered. Trees snapped like toothpicks. Dust billowed.
Tiamat tumbled down the rocky slope, reverting to her human form out of sheer shock and exhaustion. Wisps of dark energy sparked across her body. It was merely one throw, yet her internal organs felt rearranged. This was the overwhelming might of the Ancient Ming.
She lay panting in the rubble, her beautiful dress torn, her pride shattered into a million pieces.
Ren Ming landed softly next to her. Internally, he was a bit surprised. 'Emperor's Domination powers are no joke,' he thought. 'Even Li Qiye wanted to exterminate the Ancient Ming for a reason. This physique is unfair.'
He squatted down, looking at the fallen Dragon King with genuine appreciation.
"Not bad," he said, nodding. "You took the throw well. Most people would have turned into paste."
Tiamat glared at him, tears of frustration and pain shimmering in her reptilian eyes. She tried to rise, but her body refused to obey. "Kill me. Do it. I lost. The strong devour the weak. That is the law."
"Kill you?" Ren looked genuinely confused. "Why would I kill a total baddie like you? What a waste of resources. And aesthetics."
"Baddie...?" Tiamat blinked. She didn't understand the slang, but the tone wasn't murderous.
"Yeah. You're hot. Strong. Got a temper," Ren listed off on his fingers. "Totally my type. Plus, this world is full of fragile weaklings. It's nice to meet someone who doesn't break when I sneeze."
He reached out a hand. Tiamat flinched, expecting a finishing blow, but he just brushed some dust off her cheek. His touch was surprisingly gentle for a man who had just suplexed a dragon into a mountain.
"I'm not gonna kill you, Tiamat," Ren said, his voice dropping the playful edge for a moment of sincerity. "I'm looking for allies. Partners. Maybe something more if the vibe is right. You've been alone in this forest for a long time, haven't you? Chasing Ddraig's shadow? Being angry at a ghost?"
Tiamat froze. Her eyes locked onto his. "How do you know about that?"
"I know things," Ren said mysteriously. "Look, hanging out here, bitter and angry? It's bad for the skin. It's toxic behavior. Why not hang with me instead? I promise it won't be boring. And I promise I'm far stronger than both Heavenly Dragons."
Tiamat looked at his hand, then at his face. He was an anomaly. A monster in human skin. But... he was strong. Stronger than her. And for a dragon, strength was the only law that truly mattered. He had dominated her completely, yet offered mercy.
"You..." Tiamat hesitated. "You are a strange male."
"I get that a lot," Ren grinned, wiggling his fingers. "So, what do you say? Wanna grab a bite? I know a place that serves terrible coffee, but the company is S-tier."
Tiamat slowly, cautiously, took his hand. Her grip was firm, her skin cool to the touch.
"If this is all a trick..." she whispered, her eyes flashing, "Even if it kills me, I will take a bite out of you."
"I'd like to see you try, gorgeous," Ren winked, pulling her to her feet effortlessly. "Now, let's go. I think I scared the local wildlife, and I don't want to deal with animal control."
As they walked out of the forest, Ren Ming checked his internal status.
[Insight: Draconian Chaos Energy sample acquired. Hell Suppressing Immortal Physique adaptation: +2%.]
'Sweet, Ren thought. Got the Dragon Queen and a power boost. Today was a good day.'
...
The Underworld - Lucifer Castle
Deep within the crimson-hued lands of the devils, within the throne room of the Maou, the atmosphere was heavy.
Sirzechs Lucifer, the current Satan Red, sat upon his throne. His usually jovial face was uncharacteristically serious. Before him stood Grayfia, presenting the single sheet of printer paper that Ren Ming had scribbled on.
"Grayfia," Sirzechs said, reading the paper for the third time. His eyes, usually filled with warmth for his family, were wide with intellectual shock. "You say he wrote this? In a single night?"
"Yes, Sirzechs-sama," Grayfia bowed low. "And the energy residue on the paper... it is not magic. It feels like the Origin itself. I could barely look at it without feeling my own demonic power tremble."
Sirzechs leaned back, his eyes glowing with the faint crimson aura of the Power of Destruction.
"This method... the 'Myriad Origin Scripture'..." Sirzechs murmured. "It theorizes using the body as a universe to recycle waste energy. It creates a closed loop. It completely bypasses the limitations of the Evil Pieces. It ignores the bottleneck of the 'Ultimate Class.'"
He looked up at his wife. "If this spreads, the entire Rating Game system... the entire hierarchy of Devils... could be rendered obsolete. Low-class devils could rise to Ultimate-class power simply through efficiency."
"Is it dangerous?" Grayfia asked, her voice tight.
"Dangerous? Yes," Sirzechs smiled. It wasn't his usual friendly smile; it was a terrifying, excited smile—the smile of a warrior seeing a new frontier. "But it is also brilliant. If Rias uses this... she won't just beat Riser. She might have the potential to revolutionize our entire race."
He handed the paper back to Grayfia.
"Let her use it. Let her learn. But Grayfia..." Sirzechs's gaze turned toward the human world, as if trying to peer through the dimensions. "Before she does anything else... I want to meet this Ren Ming."