"What gives?" I asked Granberia as we marched down the hallway towards the foyer.
"There is a major battle going on in Grand Noah," Granberia informed us. "As you know, it is the last contested region. Once every region's control is established, the three sides will probably consolidate their gains and prepare for a long war."
"So I guess that means we need to win Grand Noah," I said.
"That would give us a strong strategic position," Alice noted. "what kinds of forces are the various sides bringing to the fight so quickly? And how did they reach Grand Noah? "
"It is not that kind of battle," Granberia replied. "With the Noah region being the last region up for grabs, the monsters and angels have sent their most powerful assets directly into Grand Noah to seize it. We will do the same. Only our most powerful allies will be part of this fight. Weaker allies would only get in the way and probably die."
"Wait, who gave the order to mobilize?" Alice asked.
"Your mother, of course."
We reached the foyer. Waiting there, many still putting on battle gear, were Ilias and her three Seraphs, Sonya, and the other three Heavenly Knights. But towering over all of them was the Monster Lord. Alice's mother. She was already in full battle gear, wearing armor and carrying a fearsome looking spear that was at least ten feet long.
"Mother, what in the hell do you think you're doing?!" Alice exclaimed.
"I am leading our forces into battle, of course," Alice's mother replied reasonably. "I have complied with your desire to see me safe, but our enemies have proven that they can reach both me and your husband practically at will. It is time for us to take the fight to them."
Alma Elma did the honors, since she had scouted the area and knew how to teleport there safely. She couldn't take us all at once, but with her speed and teleportation proficiency she came pretty close. One by one each of us were warped straight to Grand Noah. Alma Elma grabbed me second to last, just before Alice.
The scene that confronted me was pure chaos. I'd been dropped into the coliseum. It was night and the lights were on, but there was no audience. Only combatants. Very powerful combatants. Granberia and Uriela were staring at each other from a distance. I had no doubt it was love at first sight, or at least what passed for love among warriors. Uriela was hovering in the air. With a roar, Granberia leaped towards her. Their swords clashed and they tumbled into the bleachers.
Tamamo was already locked in battle with her evil counterpart and holding her own fairly well, probably due to evil Tamamo's injuries.
Minagi appeared directly in front of me. "I was hoping a man would be foolish enough to show up in a coliseum with succubi in it."
Sure enough, the Lilith Sisters were also flying around. Morrigan was already going after Alice's mother again, using her pleasure attacks from a distance. This time it looked like the Monster Lord was ready for her, however, blocking the attacks with spells of her own.
Minagi was still in the process of making obscene threats when Alma Elma warped in with Alice, our last ally. Seeing Minagi, Alma Elma got between me and the Ancestor of all Succubi.
"Oh, cute little queen succubus," Minagi cooed. "Protecting your wittle man? What kind of succubus does that? You're supposed to be the seducer, not the seduced!"
"I do things for my own reasons!" Alma Elma countered. "Don't pretend you understand anything about me!"
That was sure the truth. And then Alma Elma did something Minagi could never have predicted. She bloodied Minagi's nose with a palm strike directly to the face.
"You!" Minagi cried. "You…. You damaged my face! What kind of succubus does such a thing!"
"You're an Ancestor," Alma Elma chuckled. "You'll be fine in a couple of days. But you might want to wear a bag over your head when you feed until that heals."
"A succubus using physical force against another succubus!" Minagi spat, blood spraying from her mouth. "Heresy! I will beat you down and then consume you!"
"You can try," Alma Elma laughed, and then zipped away. Minagi followed. They were so fast I lost track of them.
Saja, seeing that Minagi had a dance partner, replaced her in front of us, her sword drawn. I summoned my shadow sword. Alice drew… Angel Halo? Oh. I guess she must have found it. I'd be hearing about that later.
"Are you here to do what your subpar queen succubus couldn't?" I asked.
"I do my duty as any loyal servant of her goddess," Saja replied. "I admit that I am glad she failed. You deserve a warrior's death."
"Frankly, I prefer the pleasure attacks."
"Then I'll be sure to finish you that way once I've subdued you!"
Knowing that Saja was better than Granberia at pure swordsmanship, and that I was inferior to Granberia, I knew that I'd have no chance crossing swords with Saja one on one in a straight fight. But I didn't have to. Alice was in the fight with me and she was no slouch with a sword herself. I could also call on the spirits.
I couldn't follow the action anymore, as battling Saja required my full attention. But I could hear explosions. I could feel the heat of fireballs passing close to me, as well as the chill of ice storms. It even rained sleet for a few seconds as two combatants I didn't get a chance to see swept by us. I heard screams of pain and rage as dark magic and holy magic found their marks.
I was grateful that I was in shape, because we seemed to be attacking and parrying for a long time, neither side gaining a real advantage. Saja had been hard pressed enough to pull out her whip, which I hated because I wasn't very good at defending against weird weapons like that. I had to rely on the flow, invoking Undine, and concentrate on not being wherever the whip struck.
Alice, never one to believe in fighting fair, but humoring Saja and I probably because she didn't know what Saja was capable of magic-wise, was obviously losing patience. Unlike me, completely focused on the duel, Alice kept glancing at her mother, still engaged in combat with one and sometimes two, Lilith Sisters. I could sense Alice collecting magic for a big spell. And if even I could sense it, I knew Saja could.
Before our battle could escalate, however, we all went down in a heap as two bodies slammed into us with a great deal of force. Kanon and Gabriela were fighting tooth and nail, or more accurately, vine and flower. No, it doesn't sound as good, but that was the reality. The two were entirely tangled up in one another. And then Kanon did something I'd never seen before.
Gabriela's vines ripped apart as Kanon enlarged herself, turning into what looked like a giant dragon made out of plants. Fortunately for Gabriela, her vines were merely extra limbs. Kanon on the other hand literally was a plant. But apparently a plant that could take on different forms. Gabriela simply adjusted by growing larger herself, countless vines streaming out to ensnare the dragon once again.
I looked around. Saja was gone. Oh, that's why, I thought. Granberia. Saja and Granberia had found each other and that was a grudge match. So where was Uriela? I looked around, trying to find the archangel warrior. I was horrified to see a headless body slumped into a chair in the stands. I guess Granberia won.
Alice was tangled up with Lilith, taking some of the pressure off of her mother, who was panting and staggering from the sisters' relentless pleasure attacks. I still hadn't seen Astaroth. I focused again on Alice, seeing if she required aid. She did not. Lilith was caught in Alice's tail and Alice was squeezing, making Lilith's eyes bulge. Catching a powerful succubus was no small feat! But once caught, Lilith would have no counter. It was going to be lights out for her, assuming Alice didn't simply crush her to death.
The wind wasn't giving me much warning, as there were sounds everywhere, but I got a split second warning as Astaroth made her presence known. And then I did something extraordinary with my power. It had just been a small thought. As I saw a vague streaking form that could only be a succubus of unknown identity, I had a brief thought that I wish I could slow down time like Spider Princess had done. And then, it was so. Astaroth every so slowly made her way towards me, hands outstretched, mouth open, stark naked, ready to latch onto me with every body part and shove me into whatever hole was most convenient. With time to set up my attack, I aimed my sword directly for her heart and thrust. Time resumed. A small bat flying way too fast slammed into the stands. I hoped Astaroth's sealed form could handle that impact.
I turned back to Alice. Lilith's struggled had become feeble. Alice released her before she passed out and left her gasping for breath on the ground. Just to be sure, I sealed her with one blow.
One on one with Morrigan, Alice's mother didn't need any help either. In fact, Morrigan was in the process of meeting a very strange end. Alice's mother laughed and taunted Morrigan, who was already halfway up the Monster Lord's….oh my. What in the world was she doing?!
Morrigan's struggles ceased and a look of pure bliss came across her face as the Monster Lord's vagina continuously contracted, drawing her further in. Her ponytail was the last thing I saw as the Monster Lord consumed her.
While some opponents were fighting for honor, and others were fighting dirty, all except apparently Alice and I were playing for keeps. Gabriela and Kanon were denied in their battle for superiority as evil Tamamo sneakily impaled Gabriela from behind, turning one of her fox tails into a spear that jutted out of Gabriela's chest. If Kanon was angry, she showed no sign of it, attaching vines to each of Gabriela's flesh limbs and ripping them off of her.
Evil Tamamo had no time to gloat. Sariela landed a few feet from her.
"I've studied you for years, fox demon!" Sariela exclaimed. "You have all the strengths: physical, sexual, magical, and your earthpower makes you nearly invincible. But do you have a defense against the fires of hell itself!?"
Tamamo only had time to look fearful before flames so hot I received burns from fifty yards away consumed evil Tamamo. Tamamo screamed and thrashed on the ground, but the fires could not be put out, nor did they seem to consume the Ancestor.
Ilias and her three Seraphs were locked in battle with the three Seraphs from Angel World, Zion, Eden, and Gnosis. Angel World Eden had switched from a flaming sword to a holy spear in order to duel Paradox Eden. Micaela and Lucifina were fighting Gnosis. And Ilias herself appeared to be in trouble taking on Zion. For all the power she had gained, she was still not even Heavenly Knight class. She may have been the weakest combatant on the field.
I wasn't sure when Angel World Lucifina had entered the fight, but enter it she did, in psychotic fashion, ripping one of Zion's arms off while cackling madly, then using that arm to beat Gnosis. Micaela from Angel World, who I had not seen before either, slammed into Lucifina and they flew off together, landing in the upper decks.
It was the greatest battle the coliseum had ever seen and there were no fans to witness it. Surprisingly the lights were still on, although the structure itself was taking a beating. As were the bodies of the combatants. I reacted in horror as Granberia was pierced through the heart by Saja's sword. But it was not yet the end for her. Granberia flew into the air, spun in a circle, and…. I'm not sure what she did. One minute she was every bit the fierce warrior woman, and the next she was Sailor Moon.
Granberia may have looked positively adorable in that outfit, but her magic was brutal. All the grudges of all the magical girls and all of Granberia's personal grudges became transformed into a brilliant white magic that overwhelmed the stadium lights and caused some combatants to briefly pause in their duels to stare. The white light enveloped Saja. When I could see her again, Saja had been transformed into a plush toy version of herself. She tumbled over and fell to the ground with a squeak.
Angel World Eden, still engaged in combat with Ilias, was grabbed from behind by Hiruko and quickly consumed. Ilias' holy energy attacks on Hiruko were brushed off as if they were nothing more than mosquito bites. Angel World Micaela, the Ancestor took far more seriously. Micaela seemed determined to slice Hiruko up until she got to her fellow Seraph.
I was knocked to the ground again, taken from behind. From my back I felt and saw Raphaela straddle me.
"The Goddess requires your power!" Raphaela shouted in my face. "And I shall take it from you!"
I came instantly as her unbelievably tight vagina swallowed my dick whole.
"I…. I thought you didn't touch men!" I protested weakly.
"You should be honored," Raphaela said. "Ahh… but your power is sweet! Give me more! I will use it to serve the goddess!"
"That's… not how it works!"
Why did powerful beings keep on trying to take my power? I immediately began pulling it back from Raphaela. She didn't appreciate that at all.
"No!" Raphaela screamed. "A pathetic being like you has no right to such a gift! It should be mine! I have always been virtous, and good! All you are is a weak-minded pervert!"
"You're the one raping me!" I yelled back. I readied to use my power to force her off of me. Since she wasn't a succubus, my penis wouldn't be locked inside her. I never got the chance. I saw Angel Halo jut from Raphaela's chest.
"How?!" Raphaela gasped. "I'm… an archangel! One hit… shouldn't be enough!"
Raphaela faded away, her essence sealed inside Angel Halo.
"Trying to take my darling's power that way makes you mortal, bitch!" Alice said angrily.
Alice pulled me to my feet. I wobbled unsteadily. She was still an archangel when I'd come inside her, which meant I was suffering from a pretty powerful dose of critical ecstasy. Seeing the continuing carnage all around me focused my attention, however.
Sonya had changed into her apoptosis form and was laying waste to any opponents who came near. Like Alice and me, she wasn't trying to kill. If anything, she seemed to be holding back. The monsters and angels, more interested in fighting each other than in engaging my allies, decided to keep away from Sonya as best they could. Sonya had already dropped at least two archangels and one ancestor, Kanade, judging by the bubbling puddle of goo on the ground under Sonya's feet.
Good little Tamamo, taking a page out of Sariela's book, had set Kanon on fire. Fire was Kanon's main weakness, I knew that much. Her screams were horrible. Erubetie was fighting Gnosis. Lucifina was attacking anything that moved, seemingly having no side but her own.
It was all so frustrating. All of these powerful beings, that could have united against chaos itself, more interested in fighting each other over a world they knew wouldn't exist soon. They were blinded by their hatred, so sure that their enemies were the most dire threat to their existence that they were failing to unite against the larger threat. Many of them had already been lost. Black Alice must be loving this, I thought. And it was starting to piss me off.
"Enough!" I yelled at the top of my lungs, and released my power, as much of it as I could, in all directions.
The seats that weren't damaged were turned into kindling. The lights shattered and the coliseum went dark. I heard thud after thud as those who had been fighting in the air dropped to the ground. In the dim light of the moon, I could see that Alice was next to me, unharmed. Somehow I'd forced my outburst to bypass her. Other allies of mine weren't so lucky.
"Ohhhh…." I heard a voice say in the distance. "That guy is such a dick!"
"I did nothing worse than what you were already doing to each other!" I yelled back into the darkness. "Now everyone spit out whoever you've eaten and start healing whoever you've wounded! This stupid war is over! You're all in a new world now! My world!"
"Getting a little big for our britches, are we? Fufufu…."
The sky lit up. A goddess descended from the sky. Not a faux goddess like Ilias or Alipheese, but the real deal. The Goddess of Chaos. Black Alice.
She was a beautiful and frightening sight at the same time. Half angel, half monster, absurdly split down the middle. She was large, too. At least two hundred feet tall.
"This was getting to be a pretty great tea party, Luka!" Black Alice said cheerily. "But you had to go and be a party pooper! You know, that I could have accepted. Versions of you have been ruining my fun over multiple worlds. But calling this world yours? I'm afraid that's blasphemy."
"Then punish me!" I yelled, beyond caring what powerful beings thought of me. "Let's end this now, one way or another!"
"Oh, that will come, old nemesis. You can be sure of that. But I don't want to just kill you. I want you to know you're less than me. You're not even at the level of my servants. This is your world? No. It's mine! All the worlds are mine! So let me teach you a lesson about your weakness. You can play with my favorite instrument of destruction."
The coliseum lights turned and focused on a new arrival floating in the air next to Black Alice. I recognized her. Adramelech.
My shadow sword was back in my hand. And then it wasn't. My power was gone, nullified, or at least hidden from me once again. Damn! How was I supposed to fight Adramelech, much less Black Alice, without my power?!
Alice handed me Angel Halo slowly. I could see the fear in her eyes. Her fear wasn't for herself. It was for me. Black Alice had chosen to make an appearance just as I had taken out anyone who could assist me. I summoned all four spirits and prepared for battle.
Adramelech didn't even bother to get close to me. She simply raised a metallic arm and fired a focused beam of energy at me. Without my power, I had no defense. Alice screamed as I was thrown against the wall separating the stands from the field. My shirt was burned away, my flesh charred beneath it. This adventure was dishing out way too much pain for my liking.
Alice threw everything she had at Adramelech. Adramelech just laughed and ignored Alice, getting closer to me. Electricity lanced from the apoptosis' hand. The magic made me convulse, my body held in the air.
"Leave him alone!" Sonya shouted, blasting Adramelech.
"Sonya…. Chaos!" Adramelech hissed, flying at Sonya.
I fell to the ground like a sack of potatoes, Alice rushing to my side. Ilias arrived soon after and began checking my injuries for what seemed the fiftieth time. I tried to move. Yep, no question, this was the most painful adventure I'd ever been on.
Lights began to come on in the stadium. Not the stadium lights, I realized, but angel light. My power had knocked everyone for a loop and the angels were beginning to regain consciousness and shine some light on our situation. I struggled to my feet. Alice and Ilias tried to hold me down, but one look from me made them decide to let me be. The first thing I did was find Hiruko.
"Hiruko!" I shouted. "Spit out Eden! Now!"
I expected defiance, but Hiruko complied at once, expelling Angel World Eden from her stomach, covered in disgusting goo, but quite all right.
"I'd always wanted to know what Eden tasted like," Hiruko chuckled. "It was…. Disappointing."
"How dare you?!" Eden protested. "I assure you, I am quite delicious!"
"Not raw," Alice responded. "Maybe in a soup? If you're volunteering…."
The next person I came across was Tamamo, the evil one. The fires were out, and although she hadn't been consumed by them, her fur was quite singed and where she had skin it looked as if she'd suffered severe sunburns. She could only lay there and whimper. Hellfire was a lot like dark magic. It wasn't the damage that was fearsome, it was the pain it caused. I placed my hands on Tamamo's bare skin. She cried out, but her cries soon turned to sighs of relief as my healing magic was poured into her. If she was even aware that I had done that for her, she showed no sign. I moved on.
I found Saja, in the form of a plush toy. I smiled. Of all the ways to vanquish an opponent, that was by far the cutest. I hugged the plush toy to my chest and wished her back to her true form. The plush turned to soft flesh as Saja returned my embrace. She had no words, however. She was clearly grateful, but too much in shock to know what to say. Alice said something snide to Saja that I couldn't hear.
I saw other monsters and angels stumbling around, some injured only by my blast, but others with severe injuries from the combat. Zion was missing her arm. My Tamamo's face was a mess, beaten to a pulp by an unknown opponent. Alma Elma and Minagi lay together at the far end of the field, legs and arms tangled up, both suffering from critical ecstasy and then getting knocked out by my blast. Apparently Minagi had managed to dictate what kind of fight it would be. That part of it had evidently ended up a stalemate.
And then there were the dead. Uriela. Gabriela. Morrigan. Morrigan!
"Spit her out!" I ordered the Monster Lord.
"I do not spit," Alipheese the Fifteenth replied. "I only swallow."
"He means it, mother!" Alice warned. "Expel Morrigan from your…. You know what."
"As you wish, my favorite son in law," the Monster Lord said.
Morrigan fell out of the Monster Lord's vagina, looking basically unharmed.
"Are you okay, Morrigan?" I asked.
Morrigan looked up at me, her eyes big and confused and…. Innocent?
"WAAAAHHHH!!!!!" Morrigan bawled.
"What did you do to her?!" I asked Alice's mom.
"All your experience and you've never seen an unbirth before?" she replied.
"What the hell is an unbirth?!"
"It is a process by which some monsters can reverse the birth process," the Monster Lord explained. "It can kill by dissolving the opponent, or in this case, it destroys the opponent and recreates them. Although you did not allow the process to complete, so Morrigan is still Morrigan. At least physically."
"Goo goo," Morrigan replied.
"Her mind has evidently been returned to a newborn's state," Alice's mother continued. "But since she is physically an adult, she should mature quickly. Within a year or two. But her memories of who she was are gone."
"Momma!" Morrigan said happily, looking up at Alice's mom.
"Awwww…." The Monster Lord cooed. "You always wanted a sister, Alice. Now you have one."
"Wanna suck!" Morrigan said. "Semen now!"
"Okay, little tyke," Alice said, scooping Morrigan up. "Only second hand semen for you until you are mature enough to eat it directly from the source."
"Awwww…." Morrigan said, pouting.
Sonya returned, landing in her Sonya Chaos form, looking a little beaten up, but mostly okay.
"Adramelech? Is she….?" I asked.
"Gone, but not destroyed," Sonya answered. "I got the better of her, and Nuruko did a great job of making sure the battle wasn't catastrophic for Grand Noah, but…. We'll be seeing her again."
More to worry about, but that was in the future. For now, I was very angry about something more immediate.
"Are you people happy!?" I shouted. "All this pain, all this death, all this…. Whatever unbirthing is! Has anyone else been unbirthed today!?"
The monsters and angels within my sight looked around, then decided that evidently there had been no other unbirths in this particular battle.
"What are you even fighting for?!" I raged. "Because you're different?! Because hundreds of years in the past, the counterparts of your enemies were awful to you?! I united these worlds to give you all a chance to make a new start! A chance to unite to fight the real threat that we face. Adramelech! Black Alice! Chaos! The end of everything! And what do you do as soon as you're reunited! You fight! You kill! You rape! You… unbirth."
"No one here is dead, Luka," Ilias said gently.
"You didn't notice the headless Uriela in the stands, Ilias?! Or the drawn and quartered Gabriela?!"
"Neither are dead," Paradox Eden said. "The Great Monster Wars saw dozens of engagements, just like this one. All were savage, and every single one ended inconclusively, with no Ancestors or Seraphs dead. At least this is how it went on our world."
"Hey! Ilias variant!" Uriela's severed head shouted. "A little help?"
Uriela's body had risen from the stands and begun flying around aimlessly. Ilias picked up Uriela's head and reattached it to her body, then used her healing magic to secure it. Micaela was already reassembling Gabriela for the same purpose. Somehow that made me even more angry. It made the whole thing seem like an extremely violent pillow fight, just for kicks. Maybe there had been a strategic purpose. They'd wanted to take Grand Noah. But to these immortals it was just a game. For those less powerful, it meant only death.
"That makes all of this even more idiotic!" Alice exclaimed, cradling her new… sister? In her arms. "You fight, and you keep on fighting, even though it's almost impossible for you to kill each other! It's pointless! Wouldn't it be better to just learn how to live with each other?!"
"We figured out how to wipe our opponents out once," evil Tamamo said. "We'll do it again!"
"You tell her!" Sariela agreed enthusiastically. Evil Tamamo looked at her strangely.
"You all have a choice to make, right her and now!" I yelled. "You can keep on doing this wihle the world burns around us, or we can start getting along and working together! C'mon, guys! How about it? At least call a truce until the Goddess of Chaos is defeated!"
"It is a wise course," Saja admitted.
"I agree," Micaela chimed in.
"If you all can agree to stop fighting, I'll ally with you against the Goddess of Chaos," Lucifina said.
Hope welled up within me. The oldest and wisest of the monsters and angels seemed to be considering truce. And then it was dashed.
"We dare not!" Minagi protested. "Only our master can make that choice!"
"Then I shall advise her accordingly," Saja said.
"Ilias will never go for it," Gabriela said. "The monsters have committed too many crimes, and they want to bring the world they created, a world of slavery and oppression of humans, here. Ilias will never give up until humans are liberated."
"Your 'liberation' is just another form of slavery!" Saja countered. "At least on our world, humans could live, work, and love who they chose!"
Hoo boy. Now it was getting political. The battle had indeed been pointless. Nothing whatsoever had been settled. I had no idea how to make it right. Alice and Ilias, on the other hand, seemed to be thinking. And they looked just as angry as me. I wondered if they had any better ideas than I did.
On the bright side, my little temper tantrum had scared both sides off, leaving us in control of the Noah region, so at least if the war was going to continue, we'd achieved our objective. There probably wouldn't be anymore fighting for awhile. There were no more regions being contested, and all three sides needed to lick their wounds. The angels were down three, with Gabriela, Uriela, and Zion all too injured to fight for a few weeks. On the monster side, Tamamo, already in bad shape thanks to me, was in even worse shape. Minagi and Saja were also suffering lingering effects from the battle. Apparently in Saja's case, getting turned into a plush toy damages more than just dignity. And Morrigan. Well…. It would be a long time before she could fight again. First she had to be potty trained. As a matter of fact, all three Lilith Sisters would be unavailable for a time. Astaroth had been sealed and Lilith's ribs severely damaged.
I fervently hoped that it would be enough to at least pause the war long enough for me to figure out how to put an end to Black Alice. For the first time, I'd seen the enemy directly. Now I just had to figure out how to fight her without being able to fall back on my power.