The next day, Rakna's clones finished their duty, assisted in the evacuation, and ultimately merged back with their creator. Only Ranka continued to train Lilith as she saw fit. Something of which the repercussions had become a routine for everyone on Earth.
Alongside the periodic earthquakes, they would often hear and feel the air shaking from the clash between the Asura and Doppelganger.
As one more of those clashes occurred in the early morning, a shockwave spread throughout the city and Ramsa tugged the wild flailing strands of hair behind her ear.
"Those two are getting more reckless by the hour," she sighed. "Can't you tell your clone to control herself?"
"{Ranka is pretty independent as far as a clone is,}" the voice of her son, a term that still made her happy to use, echoed in her mind. "{She won't listen to me if she truly wants to do something.}"
"{…isn't that dangerous?}" Soma asked cautiously.
Rakna snickered. "{No. I have absolute control in the end. Unlike my other clones whose tails I have to retrieve, I can terminate her incarnation and she will automatically return to me through my soul. Consider her something I can invoke at will.}"
"{Hm… I see.}"
"{Also, Ranka is still me. She can do whatever she wants, but she will never act against my interests since they are hers as well. That is to say, 'I' am not insecure enough to rebel against 'myself'}."
Ramsa smiled thinly. "Yes… that very much sounds like you. I can easily imagine one of your clones laughing at the face of any glib tongue out there trying to incite them."
Next to Rakna on the other side of the hill, Astraea giggled in amusement, her hands firmly placed on the ground as she used her divine affinity to purify the area as much as possible.
The werewolf snorted before his attention was grabbed by Soma.
"{By the way, it has been quite a while since you started 'that'. How many do you have now?}"
His question made Rakna look down at the ground where a small ripple in the soil under him was accompanied by lunisolar embers. These ripples were constant; emerging from within his vicinity for half a day already.
"It has slowed down compared to the start but… about sixteen thousand."
Ramsa and Soma simultaneously held their breath. When Rakna had told them he was going to be summoning familiars during the Ritual, they were skeptical of its usefulness. After all, not only was he already focusing on the Ritual along with them, but also funneling significant amounts of energy to his clones.
Their opinion, however, was nothing less than demolished when Nine-Tailed Wolves with purple eyes and silver fur climbed from underground to show themselves.
Each of them was equal if not stronger than seasoned soldiers. But that wasn't all. All of them were elementals made of Lunisolar Blaze and Earth Magic, possessed their own reserves of energy, and wielded some of their creator's abilities.
"{…it is quite terrifying actually,}" Soma smiled wryly.
"Hm," Rakna shrugged. "I hoped for more. But somehow, I seem to be reaching my limit. Even if my wolves take energy to create, they don't need more of it to remain summoned. I thought I'd be able to summon as many as I wanted. But it seems they're still linked back to me in the end. It's as if I'm holding imaginary leashes; it's getting hard to stop them from slipping due to the number. If I try to go further, it'll start to negatively affect my overall strength."
"{I see. Still, this is already amazing. The full force of these familiars constitutes an army no lesser than the demons or our people,}" Ramsa commented.
"Well…" The werewolf narrowed his eyes. "They're not necessarily meant to fight."
"{…? What do you mean?}"
"Let's say they'll be one of my trump cards."
* * *
Another day passed and a particularly violent earthquake struck the Earth. A crevasse opened across a mountain range in the distance and the pressure built inside expelled countless boulders into the air. It wasn't a volcano or anything of the sort. The planet was simply being pressured so much from the inside that it was starting to gain critical levels of surface tension.
"It's getting pretty bad, huh?" A feminine voice commented from behind Rakna and he opened one eye to look at the source.
Ranka casually stood to his right with her arms crossed. The werewolf raised an eyebrow and let out a huff. "I suppose so," he said and turned to the two people following his clone, which consisted of Astraea and Lilith.
"…you have seen better days," he smiled at the demoness, who was practically dragging her feet and perpetually a step away from collapsing in exhaustion.
The newly awakened Guardian Asura threw him a weak glare. "Whose fault is that?" She grumbled in annoyance, still in the process of dusting her clothes.
Rakna snorted. "At least you've gotten stronger," he added after his eyes flashed briefly. "See? I told you; you have talent," he said and Lilith couldn't stay mad.
She puffed her cheeks and sat on the ground. "You could have trained me yourself…" She muttered to herself, almost imperceptibly if it wasn't for her entourage's inhuman senses.
Ranka scowled and gave her a sharp stare. "Oh? What is that I hear? Are you dissatisfied with me?"
"…no, Ma'am," Lilith sighed in defeat.
"Put more conviction into it."
"No, Ma'am! I'm not dissatisfied!"
The therian nodded. "Good."
Watching this, Rakna couldn't help but smile wryly. "What are you, a military instructor? Don't go around making people call you 'Ma'am' too. You're still me, you know?"
"You have a problem with me too?" Ranka retorted challengingly.
"…that Sin of Pride really is something," the werewolf snickered to himself. Leaving the comedic air of this exchange behind, he changed topics. "Did you girls finish the array?"
"Yes," Ranka simply nodded, which Astraea mirrored.
"It's ready to be activated," the Egregore Goddess added. "For now, we left it to Norio. But with the capacity it has now, the barrier will only last about ten minutes."
"I poured as much Lunisolar Blaze as I could, but that's the maximum I could make fit," Ranka said afterward. "Neither of 'us' are used to it, after all. I had to improvise a few runes on the spot. You'll see for yourself when we merge back."
"So, going past ten minutes, we'll need someone to supply it directly," Rakna nodded. "You might have to do it yourself later on," he mused whilst eyeing his doppelganger.
"What?" Ranka scowled. "Then are you going to fight Tarnished Death without 'me'?" She inquired slowly. There was no doubt that she meant it as his 'Tenth Tail' rather than her current form.
"If I determine I can do so without you, I'll do it if it comes to it."
"…" The therian narrowed her eyes silently.
"And didn't you already prepare a perfect replacement?" Rakna continued with a smirk and after a small tilt of her head, Ranka's lips also began to curve ominously.
"Indeed…" She replied and both of them simultaneously eyed Lilith, who unconsciously stepped back as a shiver coursed throughout her body.
"…eh?" The demoness exclaimed nervously.
* * *
"…it's about time," Rakna muttered as he opened his eyes. The Lunisolar Blaze that had persisted on the corrupted hill for a while had finally lost its grasp. Yet, the crimson land was far from clean.
Perhaps it was the Fiend being clever, but the corruption had retreated deeper underground just enough so that the flames wouldn't be able to fuel themselves off of it.
By now, the shaking of the earth had stopped being sporadic. It was a constant thrum; a vibration that was getting stronger and stronger by the second.
"{It seems so,}" Soma replied calmly as the sky began to darken.
At the same time, Zikserth landed a few meters away from Rakna. Faruth and Merid, among others, were stationed inside the city as commanders. The Tarasque was still quietly looming over it but based on the mana currently rising within the creature's body, it was preparing to move.
"Are we sticking to the original plan then?" The Demon King asked. The power radiating from him at the moment was nothing like it was when he was injured a few days ago.
"Hm," Rakna nodded succinctly. "You, Soma, Ramsa, and Tarasque will face Bhumi. As for the Fiend, leave it to me and…" He looked to the side, where Lilith sat and meditated, a bright green Agni Ring shining behind her back.
"I'm ready," the demoness spoke before he could even say her name.
The werewolf chuckled. "Then, remember; follow my orders and stick to only supporting me until I tell you otherwise," he said and stood up. He extended his hands outward and a pair of opposite-colored magic matrixes spun into existence inside his palms.
Purple flames burst out of them, followed by the sound of an ethereal hammer, and then by a spike of star energy. In barely a few seconds, two great curved swords of exquisite appearance formed in his grasp.
One was white and the other black. Each also shared the other's color to some extent. The blades were long and curved. Intriguingly, the white one had an inverted blade, with the sharpened edge being on the back. The black one was normal in comparison, though had strange grooves on the sides of its blades; all parallel and carefully carved in.
Without a word, Rakna inspected them and tossed them toward Lilith. The demoness flinched in surprise but she didn't have to do anything as the sabers twirled and buried themselves deep into the ground in front of her.
"Gān Jiàng and Mò Yé," Rakna nonchalantly named both weapons while Lilith was still staring at them in shock. "Not exactly the most caricatural weapons for a demon but… I think they'll suit you well. I'm sure you can live up to the sacrifice they represent."
Lilith pursed her lips and reached for the hilts. The moment her hands touched the weapons, she felt them call her soul. She pulled them out of the ground in a trance and barely felt any weight. They shone faintly in their respective colors as if acknowledging her.
"…thank you. I'll make good use of them," she declared.
"I trust you will. Now get away from here both of you," Rakna popped his neck and began to pour mana into his wings to become airborne. "The war horn's about to be blown."
The two demons nodded and flew off without a word. At the same time, the werewolf had already begun to ascend over the top of the corrupted hill and the magic circles and runes that composed the Ritual became visible to the naked eye.
Rakna quickly spotted Ramsa and Soma hovering on the same level as him and they looked at each other in implicit understanding. He clasped his hands and focused on his Sage Aura. He discarded all of it for the sake of his soul power once again and the purple flames immolated his entire body in an instant.
This Ritual was a simple one; accumulation, refinement, ignition.
Soma would be providing Lunar Energy, Ramsa would be providing Solar Energy, and Rakna would bring them together with his Obsidian Star. It was a Ritual designed to maximize the output of the Lunisolar Blaze beyond its limits.
Ramsa unfurled her wings as wide as they could go and the sun in the sky began to shine stronger, to the point that the crown of light expanding around it made it look at least twice as big.
Soma moved his hands at a measured pace and slowly clasped his hands. He rotated his wrists and then immediately began to distance them from each other vertically. On cue, thousands of strands of bluish light suddenly converged into one spot between his palms.
Although he had yet to separate them for even more than a centimeter yet, a miniature moon could be seen being stitched out of the lunar strings like a ball of yarn.
Simultaneously, similar strings had begun to form a miniature sun in front of Ramsa. The source of these threads of energy naturally was the Ritual they had spent the past few days making. What they were doing now could be defined as crafting the processors and wiring them together.
That is why Rakna was also displaying a similar view; an obsidian star packed with purple flames sitting in his palm, his tails pointing at it, and connected to the Ritual Formation with black threads.
The werewolf gazed at his construct silently before directing his eyes downward. In that instant, a particularly violent shock spread throughout the planet. It was accompanied by a loud noise; some sort of underground explosion, muffled, but no less threatening.
Soma and Ramsa paled slightly when they heard it. Especially when it repeated itself and the land below distended upward. Trees began to tumble, rocks crumbled to pieces, the soil upturned, and animals bolted off as far as possible.
A third 'knock' resounded and the landscape became even more warped. Something was ramming the very surface of the Earth and everyone who heard it knew so.
Back in the city, Astraea stood at the crux of the barrier's array with Norio, ready to turn it on the moment that the Fiend's miasma began to overtake the planet.
"This is freaky…" The demon mage next to her grimaced as he supported himself against a wall due to the shaking. The weather was already starting to show signs of chaos, and the temperature was dropping rapidly.
Norio groaned. "At this rate, the Earth will fall apart either way…"
"…" Astraea pressed her lips together with a grim expression.
"Miss Angel?" He raised an eyebrow in concern.
"…it is nothing," she whispered and looked up at the sky. 'If only it was that simple…' She thought to herself. She understood her Lord Monarch well enough by now.
Despite his promise, something that she trusted he would try his best to follow, she knew he would also risk his life to do anything he considered right. Rakna Xiorra was a simple man like that. Much like his uncle was, he was neither good nor evil. He simply lived by his creed.
And as she watched the celestial trinity becoming one in the distance, she braced herself for what was to come. "I hope my fears are unfounded…" She muttered to herself.
After all, at the moment, even if it was her Monarch; defying an Outer One was suicide.
* * *
The Ritual came to life as the moon, sun, and obsidian united. A shining star of white-silver flames triggered a myriad of runes and magic formations. Beacons of Lunisolar Blaze lit up one after the other around the corrupted hill.
Hundreds in number, spaced apart by a few meters, they drew a geometrical formation all around the hill and reignited the flames, once again eating away at the corruption.
Soma's hand trembled whilst facing the Lunisolar Star and his face dripped with cold sweat. '…this is more than I estimated,' he thought and glanced at Ramsa who was even worse off. Compared to himself and Rakna, her strength ranked a stage lower. The Ritual was taking a heavy toll on her.
As he thought that, he was startled by a burst of power he knew very well.
Rakna summoned his Tenth Tail and the Lunisolar Star became twice as big. However, despite that, instead of becoming harder to control, Ramsa especially, saw her burden alleviated. She looked at her 'son' in surprise as he stared at their combined effort.
"Leave the rest to me," he spoke to both gods as a fourth 'knock' struck below. He flicked one finger upward and the star began to ascend, distancing itself from its supposed target.
Soma and Ramsa gradually lowered their arms when they felt every last bit of strain taken away from them. They looked up to watch the star approach the blanket of clouds in the sky.
Under not only their gaze, but everyone in the demon city, a purple magic circle began to expand right above it like a crown. Hundreds of lunisolar runes designed by Ranka were inlaid in its outer layers, and at its center glowed Rakna's innate crest; caricaturing his tails, wings, and stars.
"[Pirakācam, Uḷḷārnta Oḻuṅkiṉ Kaṇ] (Shine, Eye of Innate Order)."
The werewolf's voice echoed hauntingly and, in a flash, the Lunisolar Star plunged into the clouds and set the sky ablaze for kilometers. It happened faster than it could be seen.
"[Ulakai Naṭivamaikka Oru Cuḻaṟci] (One Rotation to Shape the World)."
The flames began to whirl, slowly at first, as if a machine being revved to life.
"[Pirapañcattai Uruvākka Nūṟu] (One Hundred to Create the Universe)."
After a few seconds only, the sky had become a whirlpool of flames, making oddly mellow sounds repeating themselves in a crescendo.
"[Vāḻkaikkai Uruvākka Ayiram] (One Thousand to Create Life).
Once the fourth line of the incantation was spoken, the speed increased by more than two-fold and swelled vertically, creating a cone-shaped tornado. The tip of the phenomenon stopped in midair though, never reaching the ground, and seemingly conjured a small pinkish light.
"[Ethirmaṟaikku Oru Muḻumai] (One Eternity to Burn).
Gradually, the large volume of Lunisolar Blaze shrunk and flowed into the tip. Bit by bit, the power that had been ravaging the sky was confined to one single point. Leaving a clear hole in the clouds, illuminated by a faint pink hue emanating from the resulting object; a jewel-like stone in the shape of a tear.
Ramsa looked at the jewel in awe, the distance doing nothing to stop her from inspecting it despite its size not being any bigger than her own thumb.
Not only was this gem fashioned after a perfect manipulation of an entire Ritual's output but there was a cohesive sense of power and beauty coming from it that she had never seen before.
Soma merely squinted his eyes and while they were admiring the result of Rakna's spell, one final tremor shook the Earth, and accompanied by a terror-inducing aura, a giant claw punched through the top of the hill.
Ramsa tore her eyes off the jewel and looked down with a pale countenance. An almost colorless miasma of corruption erupted from the consequent hole and quickly spread; whatever it touched became distorted like a mirage.
A loud roar, overlaid with dozens more, resounded and the dreadful hand that had burst out of the ground pushed the rest of its body up. The creature emerged, its abnormally long arms connected to a torso covered in black fur, contrasting with the scales of its limbs. Bone spikes of random size jutted out from its spine and turned into a sort of collar around its neck.
Its head had three pairs of eyes, no nose, and a mouth that disturbingly started from the middle of its face to below its neck in a vertical alignment.
Rakna narrowed his eyes at that. Because right below that creature, he could already sense at least a dozen more climbing their way out. Some were bigger, some smaller, but all had their unsettling traits.
A head that looked like a ribcage; a face on the back; disconnected muscles and organs connected by an invisible force; three pairs of arms and no legs; and more.
Each of them was nothing more than a Shade. Yet, they emitted auras of the highest levels.
"I see. Quality over quantity," Rakna commented as the propagating corruption was halted by his soul flames before it could even touch the tip of his fur. In the distance, a dome of Lunisolar Flames formed over the city soon after, repelling the anomalous threat.
"Rakna," Soma raised his voice grimly as the first Shade promptly opened its monstrous maw and started powering up a mass of red energy.
"I know," the werewolf said and swung his arm, blasting away the corruption in the vicinity with his soul flames. "You two can leave now."
Ramsa frowned and was about to protest, but Soma appeared next to her with a raised hand. He glanced at the jewel silently floating in the sky and nodded at his son. "It's fine. We'll charge right back in when Bhumi appears," he told the Sun Goddess and she begrudgingly followed him in the direction of the demon city.
Once they were gone, Rakna indifferently looked down and watched as the Shade fired a chaotic tide of pure demonic energy at him. Wordlessly, he pointed his palm at it.
"[Gradation Helix Assembly,]" he activated a freshly synthesized skill; something made possible thanks to the Random Skill Card rewarded for his Ascent before entering the Simulation.
In the blink of an eye, a hexagonal shield many times bigger than himself materialized. Gleaming with a purple gradient, it appeared composed of infinitely smaller hexagonal shapes.
At first sight, it resembled the simple Gradation Hex Buffer; a flawed kill that Rakna had learned long ago. However, this time, it was thinner, brighter, and strangely, despite the many geometrical shapes composing it, there was some kind of optical illusion in place forming a spiral on its surface.
This new skill was made from a combination of two unexpected additions; Mana Helix, a passive ability that increased Mana and Stamina, and a skill gained from the Random Card; Field Rally.
It allowed the user to create thousands of stable and identical, but weak mana concentrations with very minimal effort. The first idea Rakna had was carpet bombing. But it quickly changed when he realized it was the complete opposite of the Hex Buffer's flaw.
As for Mana Helix, while discarding the skill reduced a few statistics, the potential it had with the two others more than made up for it.
The System itself had a hard time synthesizing it properly too. It nearly failed for the first time and Rakna not only spent a Skill Point but also forced its completion with Philosopher Craft.
The werewolf smiled as the Shade's attack was about to hit the buffer. He was not worried in the slightest about the result. After all, this defense wasn't just one shield…
It was thousands.
The demonic wave struck and the Gradation Assembly did not even budge. The red energy broke apart on impact and split into hundreds of stray beams. Mystifyingly, each of those beams was as straight as a ruler, and the more they traveled, the more frequently made ninety-degree turns.
From a distance, it looked like a giant spiral made of crimson circuits.
At the same time, Rakna grinned as the energy located at the center of the spiral was absorbed by the Assembly and transferred right back to him.
"Thanks for the boost," he laughed and pointed one finger at the pink gem above, his mana output increasing even more. He intoned the last line of his incarnation and waved his finger down.
"[Oru Minchāratthil Iranthu Viṭuvadhu] (One Instant to Die)"
The tear-shaped object sparkled and slowly began to drop. The Shades that had come out of the ground looked up simultaneously, but with their limited intelligence, they disregarded whatever such a small thing could do to them and prepared another offensive on Rakna.
Unfortunately, they never realized that the moment it began to fall, nothing they did mattered in the slightest anymore.
"[Cantira Cūriya, Naṭcattirattin Kaṇṇīr] (Lunisolar, Tear of The Star).
The rosy tear shattered on the ground near the shades. Delicately, almost. It splintered at first and then burst into miniature pieces that reflected light.
It was like a soft chime.
In their last moments, the Shades did not notice anything. Without flourish, one Lunisolar ember flickered and died. Then, in the blink of an eye, everything vanished in a blast of heat.
That was the only way Lilith, Zikserth, Soma, and Ramsa could describe it at least. Being the closest to the phenomenon, it was the best they could manage.
Before they knew it, the corrupted hill had disappeared. Instead, what was left was a hole so deep they would believe that it led right back to the other side of the planet. Pieces of the Shades were strewn on the edges of the hole, quietly being gnawed by the silver-white blaze.
The wind was peaceful. The Earth had stopped shaking. Even the corruption miasma was paused as if in a state of shock at what had happened.
Rakna lowered his arm and gazed at the hole with Crystal Sight. He sensed something deep within the planet glaring back at him with hatred and he smirked mockingly.
"You didn't like my welcome?"
An eruption of miasma responded to the werewolf's taunt, concluding a first encounter that ended faster than anybody could have expected, and signaling the beginning of the second.