Monarch of Darkness, Arsene

Frantically trying to parry, metal shards trickled from the edge of Enoch and Noctua’s blades. They roared as they circled me, trying to gain the advantage as Noctua attacked me head-on while Enoch flanked.

Flickers of sword light shrieked, steel against steel, slashed and clanked against one another in a flash of light that made the concept of light seem like a snail’s pace. Hundreds of thousands of sword strokes flared with embers, so hot worlds began to burn from their intense heat.

Each clash created faults throughout the space-time continuum, erecting new powers through the Myriad despite us being so far from the nearest civilizations.

“Severing Fang,” Noctua howled, whisking his sword towards my midsection. The Heavens dimmed, severed by the horrid concept of ‘severance’ capable of cutting all things within the known Myriad Heavens.

And with my bare hand, I caught hold of his sword, smirking as his power shattered, as the surprise followed, and then the deadly realization of me overpowering the concept themselves. Noctua could not even react as his head fell, ending his seventh life.

“Zariel’s first concept was Severance. I’ve long figured out how to defend against it: If you are going to combat me to the death. You had better fight me using a concept I’ve never seen before or researched.” I informed him, chuckling as my gaze landed on the petrified Enoch.

‘… You can’t kill me.” He stammered to say, which surprised me.

“Is that so.”

“Mephisto!” He roared, bleeding from every orifice.” I’m protected! You think the Eternals and Great Ones will allow this!”

The Eternals? Great Ones? Like the Pale Lord? Oh, I see. So he’s in bed with the likes of them. Those monsters are all usually hidden in the Abyss or in an eternal sleep. Would they care or—

Snapping my finger, freezing space around me, I frowned, turning to the blazing azure arrow coming out of subspace. My heart went cold as I looked around, finding nothing.

“So you are here. Show yourself, Azathoth.” I coldly ask.

“We can’t allow you to kill Enoch.” The grim voice of Azathoth echoed far and wide, without emotion, through the Myriad.

“Now, this is a trump card.” I laughed, wondering if I’d need to wake my real body. There were few people I needed to be serious with, having gauged their power before. And Azathoth was one of them. The who rivals the Primordial of Chaos.

Several meters from Enoch, the Primordial Chaos of the Myriad oozed out from the void into being, taking the form of a silver-haired man, his eyes bandaged by a linen visor. He was tall, nearly seven feet tall, with an onyx-colored bow strapped to his chest and a glaive to his back.

“I think the last time we clashed… was when I was about to kill Cthulhu during the second war of Heaven’s End.” I grinned as we circled the other within the confines of space. The sounds of battle within the background faded into nothing as we felt their intent shift to us.

“You were young then. Barely a pup.” Azathoth said.

“Hmmm. Yes. I was quite young. But I wasn’t a fool. An outer God… or should I say an Arcadian God like yourself, could have surely killed me back then.” I said, nearly recalling when Cthulhu tore through the wall between the Abyss and Myriad, returning with his nature twisted beyond recognition.

He slaughtered quite a few Forsaken before we noticed he’d become a God himself. Nearly the level of us Angels and Fallen.

“I can kill you now if you’d like,” Azathoth informed me, his tone cordial as always: “Not that it’ll make a difference. After all, your Main Body is hidden.”

Azathoth, the Pale Lord, and all others are from the future, like Izalith. What happened to these monsters to give me the sensation of them knowing me? It’s off-putting.

“Give it up, Mephisto. You’ve yet to enter Arcadia. This battle will end before it begins.” He conveyed, reaching for the glaive attached to his back. He unhooked it, revealing an obsidian edge forged by some manner of beast I didn’t recognize.

BOOOM~

Kicking towards Enoch, the shattering sound of glass hissed around my sword as its fine edge broke through multiple dimensional barriers. It shone a power that turned Azathoth’s expression cold.

A catastrophic storm erupted as my sword clashed against his glaive, rattling the Myriad and sending a stir through the Various Heavens. Gods of all kinds arose, their intent invading our location as, one by one, more and more began to reveal themselves. Whether it was those from the Council of Omnis to even the weaker insignificant gods, they began to make their presence known as my blade, gritted against Azathoth’s Glaive, already chipped by my sword.

“You’ve got a terrifying weapon there.” He admitted, strained. When from my rear, sword light flashed, as Noctua reformed and entered his eighth life given from the darkness. Stabbing his sword aimed at my heart, I did nothing but allow it, watching as his blade bounced right off.

“Weapons don’t work on you?” Azathoth curiously asked.

“Yours might.” I mused, narrowing my gaze towards the otherworldly sensation I got from it. For this battle, I toned my body to be immune to most weapons within the Myriad Heavens. The only sacrifice that came with that was that I was susceptible to more elemental base attacks. Unfortunately, for Noctua, I was quite proficient in most elements, so that weakness was covered. If he wanted to harm me with a sword, he’d need the bone of a fallen Angel. A powerful one.

“What!” Noctua roared when a sudden honking noise entered my ears.

The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end as both Asteroth and I looked at one another, fear visible in each other eyes. We vanished, pivoting in a blaze of Qi, leaving Noctua as the honking grew loader.

And from the subspace, she came, honking her truck like the mad woman she was. A fine sheen of blood washed over the surface of Zariel’s little sister’s truck as she blew the horn. ‘TRUCK-KUN STRIKES AGAIN!!!!”

“… Is he dead?” Azathoth asked at the jaw-dropping scene that made to no sense. We were gods. But for gods to die from a truck was practically unheard of. If not humiliating. 𝚋𝚎ｄ𝚗ｏｖ𝚎𝚕．ｃｏ𝚖

“… No idea how she did it. But Truck-kun has a one-percent chance of killing any god, no matter how powerful they are. It’s retarded how powerful it is.” I told him, sighing, as she blew her horn, laughing with madness in her eyes. “The only downside is that they are forced to enter the wheel of reincarnation. So it’ll never be a true death.”