The white-haired devil's shadow was not in its unrecognizable form now. Rather, the white-haired devil's appearance was now his original form; long white hair with sinister red eyes, black tattered clothes and an extremely pale skin.
He shoved all the beasts that came biting him from every part of his body, and these creatures seemed like it was easting his soul bit by bit. The white-haired devil grunted angrily, clawing off a python that bit half of his arms and it turned back to the red fog that surrounds him. "What the hell is wrong with these creatures?! They dare to nibble at my soul and eat me alive! No! I should be thinking how did these measly creatures can even hurt me!"
At first, he thought that the red fog inside this domain was harmless to him but, as the time continue to pass, his vision started to get blurry and his senses become dull. So now, after half an hour of staying inside the [Covenant of Blood], his strength was getting weaker and weaker as well as his confidence.
"No! I can't die like this! There must be some consequences of using this accursed ability. That girl must be running out of gracia right now." The devil thought, getting his emotion intact and not cause a blunder that will truly forfeit his life. Dying like this will bring shame upon his soul until he reincarnates, even if he's not sure if he still can reincarnate.
Then, a thought suddenly came up his mind and frustratingly said while hiding his smile, "Fuck!! If it wasn't for Luce hindering me earlier, breaking out of this domain would've been a peace of cake! Not only did he take away my remaining gracia, he even injured his own soul to give a fatal blow to mine... My plans!! My plans are all crumbling right now!"
He made sure that his voice will be heard allover the cocoon-like he's in. "Be fooled, you bitch! Once you show yourself, I'll grab you and tear you apart together with your soul!" He screamed in his mind angrily. The devil wanted Lilith to think that he was panicking and then kill her if she dare shows up in front of him. Truly a decisive plan, but he doubted that it would work on Lilith, seeing that this opponent of him was clearly trying to torture him to death until his soul perishes.
The devil killed the red fog beasts that tries to nip at him from time to time, until half an hour later, when his figure was getting dimmer, he felt that Lilith will not dare to attack him until he shows a sign of weakness. "Shit! My astral body might disappear if this continues on! I only have one chance, though it might get me more into danger, but it will certainly work. There's no backing out now, she will kill me slowly. Damn her ancestor for giving her that temperament!" The devil thought.
With a plan on his mind, he dashed towards the weakest spot of the domain ability that he could see. Forming claws the size of knives, the devil clawed his way out, leaving huge cracks on the [Covenant of Blood] the shape of claw marks. But as soon as he saw the light outside, something with a sharp surface suddenly caught his ankle and pulled him back to the domain's center.
The devil looked down what it was and saw the whip that Lilith took out previously with the aura of death looming on it. A sharp pain seeped through his ankle and he let a loud and deafening shriek. "The whip could hurt the soul! This is definitely an artifact, but where did they get this?!" He desperately tried to remove the whip that was constantly sending waves of pain onto his whole body while he was being pulled back towards the center.
Getting caught like this was not on his plans, but this was also a good thing as he can now attack Lilith with his full force. The devil poured all his gracia towards his right hand, making the other parts of his body a little more dimmer than before, "I'll kill her with the most powerful attack I could come up right now. I'll just recover later after I killed this bitch!" He thought while gritting his teeth, ready to attack as soon as he sees the woman using the whip pulling him.
"I'm surprised you're still alive and kicking after you got trapped in my domain ability for almost an hour. Your tolerance against curses was terrifying so I used my blood fog summons against you." Finally, the devil heard the voice of Lilith, but he couldn't see where she was hiding in the red fog. He also assumed that Lilith was controlling her gracia to pull him towards the center, but he dismissed that thought as he presumed that she used a lot of her gracia just to hold him off and imprison him here.
"The grip of Bahamut will not easily loosen. Only I can free you from it, so give up on getting away." As if she was looking at him closely, Lilith convinced the white-haired devil to stop resisting.
"You dare hurt my family that I hold most dear?! You are looking for your death! I swear to the heavens that if I don't kill you right now, I'll hunt you down even if you escaped to the netherworld, you bastard!" Lilith's voice echoed all over the blood red dome, filled with malice and killing intent.
The devil's eyes concentrated only on what's in front of him, his red eyes glinted a hidden killing intent behind his fearful face, even if a fly will dare to land on his eyeballs right now, he will not blink. Then finally, after pulling him towards the center of the red dome, he saw Lilith standing and looking at him with contempt with her merciless sharp ruby eyes.
And just as he thought, the whip was not personally being wielded by Lilith, but by the huge arachnid that the devil saw before the cursed red fog thickened and enveloped him. There were no red fog now that he was caught and weakened while being pulled towards Lilith, the other blood fog summons of Lilith that survived from him also watched him being dragged, snapping their fangs and snarling at him.
The arachnid gave Bahamut back to Lilith and crawled beside her queen. Lilith then walked slowly towards the devil's shadow and leaned down to glare at him closely. "How does it feel to get your soul tormented slowly until you turned to look like an dying crop."
The dimming figure of the devil's silhouette was clearly the thing that Lilith saw, thinking she already beaten him. But a thought came to her, pondering how did this devil came out really weak even though her husband couldn't beat this being.
Then suddenly, the white-haired devil revealed a grimace on his face and immediately retaliated, attempting to blow Lilith's head off. "Die!", he thought, victory in his sight.
However, that feeling washed over him as his vision became blurry and his chin suddenly lifted upwards with a massive force, knocking him upwards into the air! The only thing he could do was grunt loudly to resist the shock from the kick, that hit him without even realizing, Lilith gave him.
Starting from her kicking posture, Lilith then jumped to the air, higher than the estimated height that the devil would reach, and spun to build up force for the kick that came crushing down towards the devil's face, slamming him back to the ground with a power that would instantly kill a [Black Rank] star beast if it was hit by Lilith's kick.
A cloud of dust and sand spew out from the place that the devil came rushing down. The force of it made the ground to tremble a little and a hole as wide as a house was left on the surface, the devil lying on the center of it.
Leaving his consciousness on and off, he groaned from pain and dizziness. It's been a long time since he was beaten up so badly like this, and it made him more humiliated thinking that it was a woman who beat him to ground again.
But his suffering didn't end there when Lilith landed with her feet first in his stomach, making him throw up gold blood. After that, Lilith then whipped him using Bahamut, generously giving him whip wounds all-over his limbs and ethereal-like skin.
There were whip wounds in every corner of his exposed skin and it felt like it will go on more longer. It was fine for him if it was just a normal whip artifact with poison or cursing effects, but Bahamut was not that type of artifact.
The artifact that Lilith was using is on par with the artifacts that only the most powerful and influential beings could use; a [King Rank] artifact. The artifacts that are on the same or higher rank than Bahamut in the Renald Continent were the heirloom of the Regulus Imperial Family currently held by the Leopold, the Church of the Holy See's most hidden item, and the Crown of Thorns of the Demon King Vladimir that he passed on to Luce.
Other than that three, the artifacts that were hidden from the world will not be ranked unless they were to appear and show their brilliance to the world. Whether they were weapons, accessories, and armors. These artifacts might compare to Bahamut, but when undiscovered, all of them were just items in front of ranked artifacts.
The devil's right arm twitched and twisted while he endured the pain of his soul constantly being damaged by Bahamut. He felt like the artifact was devouring his soul's divinity every time it hits him, making him throw up more of his golden blood.
He gritted his teeth as he heard the unending sounds of the whipping on his body, "I have no choice now. I will die here if I don't make that move! I'll risk being found than being defeated by a woman!" He thought.
Then, he stopped resisting the attacks of Lilith and relaxed his body after giving off a long sigh. He gave up all the external pain just to concentrate for his final struggle. All the gracia accumulated on his right hand gradually dissipated as the color of his shadow-like body turned to look normal again.
Lilith, seeing that her opponent has finally given resisting, stared at him for a moment, not showing any emotions at all, not even pity or anger. It was just pure killing intent that flowed in the flames of her ruby eyes.
She raised her hand holding Bahamut and threw it backwards to ready her killing blow, she then put a portion of her remaining gracia in Bahamut and the whip immediately got covered with murky blood red aura, "Any last words..?" She said. The whip behind her was trembling as it was being filled with her gracia, even the air pressure seemed more heavy now.
The devil looked at her for a moment and then he smiled, "You're good, daughter of Morrighan."
"Hmph.." Lilith then whipped him with all of her remaining power with no hesitation at all. Bahamut was buried inside the devil's chest just after it hit him.
The hit almost was filled up with the stolen gracia from the devil himself and Lilith's, transcending the power of a [Demi-god Rank] and reaching a new realm. At that moment, it seemed like the whip bent the space around it and destroyed everything that it hit.
The devil's body disappeared on the sand and only left a trace of golden blood splattered all around the deep mark he left on the ground. Lilith wiped the blood on her face and heaved a sigh of relief, turning her head towards the direction where she left her son and her husband in the hands of her subordinates.
"It's over, right?" She thought out loud. The hot wind of the Desolate Zone made her platinum purple hair wave by it's will, freely moving up and down.
Lilith started to turnaround and catch up to her family when an overwhelming presence passed by her, making the hair of her body all stand. "What is this?!" She thought, feeling startled by what her instincts was telling her; turning around will caused her death.
"Tell me, child. Are you the one who did this?" A voice of an old man sounded behind her.
Lilith didn't answer immediately, instead she fixed her stance and took a long breath to calm herself. "Ye-yes. I was the one who killed him." She said, stuttering on her words due to her body being tensed up. But she did not dare looking back to see who was the old man behind her.
"Hmm..." The old man's voice pondered. Lilith also heard a little purring sound from the person behind her.
"Then tell me, Lilith.. Where's your son?" The old man's voice said, casually asking her as if he knew Lilith for a long time.
Then, Lilith's face turned dark by hearing the old man's question and clearly felt that something wrong's happening and her son is in danger because of it.