"Your territory and your spell will do for now," I said as I watched Sloth close his eyes while chewing his food. My words roused him enough to open one eye to look at us.
He grunted slightly before responding, "Sis, take what you want, but I want to continue my life like this." After saying his piece, he closed his eyes again, while another female demon came to his side to massage him. Raven looked at me for a moment before agreeing to his words. A servant demon brought us his spell before we left.
We exited the building again before Raven took over the vast territory that seemed to span across at least five times the size of Wrath's and the others' lands. The darkness spread until it reached the edges of the territory that was relinquished by Sloth. Afterward, it ground against the rest of the realm like sandpaper scrapping away at the realm.
The few sloth demons that were created and lazed around here were absorbed, as were the three-quarter of the foreign demons that I had disposed of without them being able to resist.
There were just enough foreign demons left to sustain Sloth's lifestyle. Raven sat down on a rooftop and meditated to digest the energy she got from the realm. I leaned against the railing of the rooftop and looked down at the bleak, and boring-looking city.
My gaze caught several foreign demons that seemed to run some errands. Some had looked in our direction, but quickly lowered their gaze after seeing me look at them. They were trying to blend with the crowd and scattered into the block buildings.
It was obvious that they were terrified of what would become of them, and one couldn't blame them. After all, we had just decimated a good chunk of the city's inhabitants in a few seconds.
I glanced at Sloth's resting place, and I still wasn't sure if that was the right way to approach this situation. Although Sloth didn't seem to be a danger, he wasn't without sin - pun intended.
The moment he entered the universe once again, he would either enslave some people to do his bidding or cause them to be just as lazy as him, except that they wouldn't have someone to support their lives.
I shook my head. At least, Sloth resorted to having demon servants, even if it probably was because they wouldn't tire of their work. Either way, this wasn't my decision to make. I turned my attention to Raven, who was digesting the new influx of power.
Several hours passed before she finally stood up, seemingly having finished digesting what amounted to five times the energy the others had. Well, that was if Wrath and the others themselves didn't make up the difference with the energy inside their body.
A glance at Raven and the aura she was unconsciously releasing. The boost in power was significantly more than the individual demons she had absorbed before. Her entire presence seemed to have gained a dangerous edge and depth to it. She was growing rapidly.
"You sure you won't need Sloth's energy as well? If we confront Trigon and fail because his energy is missing, then I would rather turn him into something useful by ending him." There was no question to be asked whether I would end his life if it meant Raven's survival.
Her lips thinned slightly before she shook her head. "I don't think it's necessary." My eyes met hers, and I could see that she wasn't sure about the outcome. I nodded before we turned our gaze in the direction where Gluttony was.
There was still time to reconsider after taking the powers of the last two sins, Gluttony and Greed, not realizing that we weren't in the right headspace as we left Sloth's place.
A few moments passed until we arrived in the territory of Gluttony. Although only Raven's territory had clear visual differences to the rest of the barren realm, there were still some clues to Gluttony's presence. His aura seemed to suck everything in.
We swiftly landed on the walls surrounding his castle-like city. I couldn't help but notice the similarities of the cities among the Sins. Although all had a uniqueness of their attributes to it, it was subtle and didn't influence the layout of the city. It was like they all used the same template. Perhaps they hadn't designed it? Another scheme from Neron, perhaps?
We walked towards Gluttony and even I could tell that we were closing in on him. His strength seemed palpable. Strangely, like Sloth's territory, there were a few gluttonous demons. Even the foreign demons seemed fewer than in the previous cities. The city almost felt extinct.
We approached what appeared to be the main building in the middle of the city. I looked at Raven as I watched some demons hide at our appearance before dissolving into energy flowing towards Raven, though part of the energy headed towards the building where I could sense a stronger life force from.
She caught my look. "He is constantly absorbing more energy, using it to expand his territory. I don't think I will be able to absorb him without resistance." I nodded at that, and we continued to head inside.
The crunching noises of something snapping and grinding could be heard, resounding through the empty halls of the building we had entered. The halls seemed to be medieval and lavish, like those of nobles.
We threw open the double door and revealed Gluttony devouring the legs of a struggling demon. The demon's screams were muffled inside the Gluttony's mouth and the crunching noises origin were the bones shattering underneath his jaw.
I looked to the side where some humans were cowering. They were terrified out of their minds, shivering with their cheeks stained by dried tears, while not daring to look at Gluttony. A foreign demon was watching over the humans, but it seemed like he wasn't enjoying his task, as he constantly glanced fearfully at Gluttony.
After he was done eating the demon, he looked at us for a moment before a wide grin appeared on his face. "I expected you. Heard that you are taking the others' territory. And here I thought our family only had one greedy member." He chuckled slightly before he glared at the demon, who was dragging a resisting human to Gluttony.
I had a bad feeling about this. The state in which the city was in and his words made me restless, so I moved without hesitation.
Before Gluttony could put a hand on the obese middle-aged man, I appeared by his side before smacking across the back of Gluttony's head, sending him through the wall. My other hand released a ki blade, slicing the foreign demon holding the human in half.
I was about to pursue Gluttony when the ground suddenly lit up red, revealing a pattern on the ground which looked awfully like a magical rune.
The red light converged into a figure of a demon inside a business suit. His life force equal to that of Gluttony.
"Greed." I realized before raising a hand to block the eldritch energy blast coming from his upper eyes. The force sent me into the wall before it broke underneath the pressure with unsurprising ease. The attack lasted for a second, but it was enough to send me through buildings into a rather empty backyard.
I rose into the air before I felt a demon jump onto my back, trying to bite into my neck. I grabbed its head and threw it into the crowd that was already forming beneath me. A lot of greed demons had assembled underneath me, flying towards me as I rose into the air.
More and more life forces popped up, coming from all over the place. A bright light on the ground suddenly lit up. It extended across to the other building and lit up its outline, and it wasn't just one place. Several spots in the city lit up and connected throughout the city castle, even the landscape outside lit up.
Numerous demons started to appear all over the place, and a good chunk of it headed to me. Countless demons were blotting out my view of the city, and the numbers were still increasing. Some demons were heading towards Raven, who fought against Gluttony and Greed.
It was not a number that I could deal with individually, just one punching each of them would take too long, so I raised my hand and powered up. My golden aura rose like a flame from my feet towards my hand before bursting out like a rocket engine.
[Annihilation Attack]
Several streaks of golden light soared through the sky. Hundreds, thousands, ten of thousands of light streaks covered the sky before finding their individual victims. Each streak of light represented a demon that was hit before exploding, turning their target into bits.
When the first were hit and killed, the others were still enthusiastic about their assault, but after seeing the light streak expand, seemingly indefinitely like an inescapable net. Even the stronger foreign demons that blocked the attack with their shields and barriers ended up like their weaker fellow demons. They were dying by the thousands and with each death their morale took another hit until the crowd fell into full-fledged panic.
Normally they wouldn't panic even with their 'deaths', but there were three demons that were absorbing each demon that was killed, making their deaths permanent. The realm's demons were still fearlessly flying towards me like a moth into the sun, as if they didn't care about their lives, but the foreign demons...
The panic spread like a wildfire until each and every foreign demon was trying to escape the golden light streaks that resembled certain death. Their wails, pleas, and curses turned into a muddled mess. Voices, sentences, screams indistinguishable from the rest. It was a massacre and not one demon could stop the assaulting rain of ki attacks.
A truly excellent attack. The control needed for it was rather high, especially with most buildings staying intact even after the attacks exploded. The sole purpose of this attack was to annihilate a weaker crowd of enemies.
I hovered there, looking down at the dying mass as I continued to power my attacks until all demons perished, until I couldn't sense a single demon life force. My attention was instantly caught by Raven, who took a breather as Gluttony and Greed slowly regenerated their torso that was blown to bits.
"Color me impressed. You actually survived that." I said while gently landing on the yard between the buildings where Raven and her siblings had been fighting in. I knew they had been hit by several ki blasts, but they didn't die yet. Although it was an attack with the sole purpose of attacking multiple weaker targets, making it useless against stronger opponents, I was still a lot stronger than these demons.
I wasn't even sure if they could hear my words as their heads only generated after I said these words, but it wasn't that important since their situation should be made clear by now. Their terrified expression clarified that they knew they couldn't content with me.
I might not kill them permanently with them regenerating with this realm's energy, but I still had someone that could make sure they stayed dead. A stream of energy flowed over the darkening landscape before being absorbed by Raven. However, she couldn't take away everything instantly. Part of the energy returned to Gluttony and Greed. They used the energy to regenerate their torn bodies.
Gluttony suddenly opened his mouth wide open, swallowing the ki blash I had wordlessly fired at him. His body seemed to bloat after closing his mouth before he spat the ki attack out again. The blast, now colored a bloody red, was accentuated with lightning coiling around it, obviously empowering the returned attack.
With a backhand, I deflected the attack, sending it flying into the distance at a rapid pace. It only took two seconds until it impacted a rocky mountain in the far-off distance. In the next moment, everything around us was dyed in a red hue by the bright explosion, tearing apart the landscape in the distance.
An earthquake seemed to have been resulted by the attack before the shockwave of the explosion reached us. Our clothes swaying in the wind. An obvious sign how the energy and the resulting explosion weren't as controlled and potent as before.
I glanced at the mountain that now had a giant hole in the middle, as if a giant had taken a bite out of it. It might seem more devastating since my attack wouldn't have left a dent in the mountain's shape, but to me it was just a sign that most of the energy inside was wasted on causing destruction.
Gluttony opened his mouth again and I could feel the pull on my ki. My golden aura seemed to be sucked into him as if he was a vacuum cleaner. It reminded me of that alien Kakarot fought in the Buu saga. He bloated again with the influx of energy before I blitzed behind him and horizontally swiped across his back.
The open wound of me slicing him open released the energy that he had absorbed. With nothing anchoring or controlling the energy, it exploded. I jumped back and let the explosion devastate the buildings surrounding us. The city shook while the buildings were tilted away from the center of the explosion.
I landed beside Raven, who had retreated as well, and asked her, "You okay?" My eyes, however, didn't leave the kicked up smokescreen where Gluttony just exploded at.
She nodded. "Was just a bit startled by the ambush, but I am fine." Her eyes searching the dust cloud for any signs of Gluttony or Greed, who had been close-by.
My senses told me they were both still alive, but I was hesitant to blindly fire my ki attacks into the smoke since Gluttony might absorb my energy, instead I focused on containing my energy inside my body.
Greed jumped to the side, exiting the edge of the smokescreen with streaks of smoke trailing his figure. The rest of the smoke and some energy, which was still flooding to this place, was absorbed by the wriggling bits of flesh that were squirming inside the crater left behind before merging.
Ignoring the counterfeit Majin Buu, I turned my attention to the other demon. "Let's take care of Greed first." I said while extending my telekinetic hold to Greed's body, suspending him in the air.
It was only for a second since his power exceeded what I could put out telekinetically. However, a second was more than enough in fights among beings on our level. "Wait! Raven, I can-" Shortly after he opened his mouth to beg for his life, he stilled again.
Greed crossed eyes looked up at his forehead, finding a black-purple tentacle lodged in it. The energy inside his body was being sucked out of it, only to empower Raven further than she already was.
His resistance getting weaker as his body deflated like a balloon until there was nothing but skin and bones before exploding into a cloud of dust. Raven bit her lips, drawing blood before her gaze turned towards Gluttony, who had been absorbing a large part of the energy that the demons I slaughtered had left behind.
He was slowly but surely regenerating, resurrecting himself. Half of his torso was already regenerated, but he wouldn't be able to continue. Not with Raven piercing his body with several tentacles, absorbing the energy that was meant to regenerate Gluttony's body.
It only took a moment before Gluttony's life force disappeared and Raven had to sit down cross-legged again to meditate, while more and more energy from the countless demons Greed had brought continued their way towards Raven. Sensing that all enemies in this territory were eliminated, I went to Gluttony's room, where he held the human snacks and searched for the scroll with the spell on it.
It didn't take me long until I found it, especially since he hid it underneath his mattress. I shook my head and found my way towards Raven's meditating spot and threw the spell at her, which she promptly caught before reading it. I sat down just as Raven threw the spell to the side before closing her eyes again.
I looked around at the landscape covered in darkness. I couldn't sense any life forces, so I lowered my strength again. Although the demons seemed to have a method to teleport, they didn't seem to know how to hide their life force, so it would give me some time to react as long as I was vigilant.
I didn't dare to let my transformation go, and I didn't have to worry about fatigue, since I could keep it up indefinitely when I wasn't pushing my transformation to my limits.
After a few minutes, I flew up into the sky. The surrounding landscape was being devoured by Raven's darkness. The weirdly lit lines across the city were being devoured as well, even though it seemed like it was resisting Raven's darkness. My gaze landed in Sloth's direction.
The words from Gluttony clarified that he was informed of our arrival and what we were up to. Maybe it was because Gluttony and Greed were just more sensible to what was happening in this realm, but I would bet my money on the fact that the foreign demons at Sloth's place had informed them.
Although it wasn't anything I could prove, I felt like that should be the case. Honestly, this reaction put me somewhat at ease since it seemed like Raven taking over this place wasn't in the calculations of Neron. Or was that just a false pretense? After all, Lust did say that Neron ensured our victory if Raven was on their side...
I sighed before pinching the bridge of my nose. Why couldn't things be simple for a change? A glance at Raven and the flood of energy flowing towards her made it clear that I would have to wait for her again, so having nothing to do, I found myself hovering above the city. I looked around, remaining vigilant as I wasn't looking forward to get ambushed by these no name demons again.
...
A day passed like this, waiting for Raven to get the energy under her control. At one point, her eyes snapped open and our eyes met. Her presence seemed to have deepened again after having absorbed two Sins again, but I also found a dangerous edge and a calmness to her. Her eyes almost looked tranquil.
Raven looked at Gluttony's spell on the ground. She picked it up before it caught black fire in her hands. She looked into the dark flames of the burning scroll before her gaze turned to me. "We will need to visit Greed's place for the last scroll."
"Are there too many differences between the spells? Do you really need them?" They had all been given the task of absorbing Trigon's energy, so why would they need different spells?
"It will help me digest the emotions better than without it since these spells are tailored to him, but no, I don't really have to know it. It's just a great opportunity to study it, making my own spell more efficient."
"Good enough for me." I answered as I pushed myself off the wall before slowly rising into the air. The trip towards Greed took a bit longer than expected, but it also took us closer to Trigon's resting place.
We quickly entered the castle city before we gathered the last scroll, and Raven turned Greed's territory to her own. She sat down leisurely and read through the spell before closing her eyes to meditate again. This time she only took 2 hours before she finished.
She stood up again before breathing out a cloud of black smoke. The blush on her face had receded almost completely, and she felt a lot stronger than before. She took a deep breath before nodding at me. "It's time."
I returned the nod, knowing that she meant our time for our confrontation with Trigon had come. With our target in mind, we crossed the bleak sky. I glanced at her concentrated face as we soared through the sky, noting the increase in speed she had gained over the two days we had been here.
She caught my look and smiled reassuringly at me before turning her gaze in the direction where we would find Trigon. Several moments passed until I could see the devil in question. He was tall.
I didn't mean 7 foot tall, but gigantic, building-like tall and that was with half of his body not being visible. Half of his body was inside the ground while his upper torso was bound by chains of light coming from the countless sigils of the rune that surrounded him.
His eyes were closed, and he appeared to be sleeping with a slight smile on his face, which wasn't something pleasant to see and more unsettling than anything else. We stopped just outside the edge of a rune that Trigon was emerged in.
"So, what now?" I asked as I prepared myself to create the strongest attack I could muster up. However, I hadn't expected her answer, almost causing me to stagger in surprise.
"Now we wait." She said, while staring at her father's bound form. "As long as he has most of the territory, there is a chance that he will be able to reverse my influence I already have garnered. So while I am destroying his realm, I will siphon his energy, growing stronger while weakening him even further."
I looked at her for a moment before turning towards Trigon, whose smile seemed to have grown a smidgen, though it might have been my imagination- Like Hell!
"I don't think that is a good idea. I think if we did this we are playing into Trigon's hands. Just look at his smug face." I voiced my opinion and for some reason, Trigon's face was pissing me off.
"Maybe. But what other choice do we have? If we attack now, we might not be able to handle him. The safest option would be to use my sibling's sealing runes and grind his power away until we can dispose of him with ease." She pushed my arm down which was holding a spherical swirl of ki that I had unknowingly created.
Now that I was this close, I could sense it more clearly. Trigon's life force was vast - me pushing the absolute limits of Super Saiyan vast. If he could use all of that power, I would have to pull out Ikari on top of that to barely win, but there weren't many who could use all of their strength. This had been proven to me time and time again, but the difference was Trigon, just like Raven, didn't rely on his physical body.
Even without being able to properly sense magic/demonic energy, I could feel that Raven had grown tremendously, but by how much, I couldn't be sure. I only knew that her physical strength was also somewhat boosted, but not to the same degree that her demonic/magical abilities were. So it was most likely that Trigon was vastly stronger than what his life force indicated.
"Fine. Your fight, your rules. I will just support," I responded before crossing my arms as I glared at Trigon. My lips twitched in annoyance as I looked at him. I felt like he was mocking me.
...
Several days passed, and I had even gotten some sleep in. I was first apprehensive about sleeping this close to Trigon, but Raven reassured me to get some rest before the fight.
Prior to our trip here, I had trouble keeping up my transformation while sleeping, but apparently, it just needed a hostile environment with an evil demon sleeping a few meters away to let my body understand the importance of remaining vigilant while sleeping.
I glanced at Raven, who had been meditating for almost the entire time now. She didn't seem to have any side effects from siphoning Trigon's energy. Just her hairline was turning white. I looked at Trigon, whose hairline was turning dark. Who would have known that his hair color was an indicator of his power? Ridiculous. At least, the hair color style would suit demon-Raven.
A glance at the previously desert-like barren environment now revealed encroaching darkness, representing Raven's conversion of this realm. There were just a few humans, some demons of Sloth's 'staff', and of course Sloth himself in this realm left. Though the latter's existence was tingling something in the back of my mind, but I couldn't put my finger on it.
I shook my head and dismissed this thought. He and the other demons, as well as the humans, were bound to die soon, anyway. I doubted they could survive the battle between us and Trigon, but that was their only shot at surviving, and that was all we could offer at this point. We couldn't do much more for them.
The darkness covering this realm was increasing its pace in devouring it and empowering Raven in the process. It was the reason she was constantly meditating. In her words, she didn't need to sleep with all that energy empowering her. Although mentally taxing, it wasn't something she couldn't handle. Quite the opposite, she mentioned feeling energetic.
When the darkness closed in on Trigon's seal, I knew that the fight was imminent, so I cupped my hands and placed it on my hip. This would be the first time I would use this technique in battle, but that didn't mean it would be less potent.
A spherical swirl of energy appeared in my hands. The ki produced a bright rotating light that shone between the gaps of my fingers. At this point, Raven had already stood up, knowing that the time to end her fear of her ever-looming father was coming. Either she killed her father or died trying; either way, it was to end today.
The darkness hit the seal, and it instantly appeared to be damaged by it. The light was dimming. Trigon's form instantly swayed and a dark miasma seeped out of the cracks in the seal, turning the surroundings even darker than before.
Trigon's eyes snapped open, his pupils wriggled from the back of his head to the front before fixating on us. The illusive smirk on his face turned into a full-blown smile.