Max
Leaving Kairu to dismantle the zombie, he kicked off the damp stone and launched himself into the corridors of Floor 25.
Tracking the rat started easily enough as he kept his eyes locked on the disturbed grit left behind by the parallel paths of heavy boots. However, a dozen yards down the tunnel, the smaller footprints abruptly vanished. Max slowed his pace just enough to scan the mud, quickly noticing that while the zombie's prints remained, they gouged much deeper into the earth. The distance between each stride had widened into a desperate sprint.
Piggyback ride, Max deduced, reading the sudden shift in weight. The rat is letting the meat-shield do the running.
It was a clever tactical choice to force a faster pace, but Max remained unimpressed. Channeling a surge of lightning into his legs, he pushed himself into a blur, tearing past the slick walls to close the gap.
The heavy tracks led him straight to the edge of an underground stream where dark water cut a trench across the floor. It was a natural dungeon chokepoint, notoriously used by aquatic monsters to drag unsuspecting adventurers into the current. A quick glance at the opposite bank revealed fresh gouges in the mud, proving the zombie had cleared the gap without breaking stride to carry its master across the hazard.
Bracing his legs, Max prepared to jump after them. But just as his muscles coiled with tension, Auto-Evade screamed, pinging with fast-approaching monster signals.
The dark water erupted instantly.
A swarm of monsters barreled upward from both sides of the stream, their jaws unhinging in a synchronized launch timed to crush him mid-air the moment he committed to the jump.
Instead, Max stayed firmly planted on the bank. Glaring at the annoying obstacle, he let go of all restraint. He raised his right hand toward the rushing horde and drew upon the most devastating lightning spell in his arsenal.
"Hadō #88. Hiryū Gekizoku Shinten Raihō!"
A colossal beam of lightning tore from his palm and slammed into the stream. Because the water acted as a flawless conductor, the spell fried the serpents before they could fully clear the surface. The overloaded electricity vaporized the ambush instantly, filling the tight tunnel with the sharp stench of ozone and falling ash.
Lowering his smoking hand, Max caught sight of a burlap sack bobbing in the agitated current, drifting slowly downstream.
The sickly-sweet stench of rot hit his nose, and looking at the floating bag, the pieces clicked together. The bastard didn't just get lucky with the monster spawns; he had deliberately dropped monster bait into the water to whip the local ecosystem into a frenzy, rigging a wall of teeth to buy himself time.
Anger flared hot in Max's chest. Stripping away his casual detachment, he pushed the lightning in his legs to its limit and leaped across the gap. He tore through the remainder of the 25th floor at a breakneck pace, ignoring the stragglers, until he cleared the stairwell and burst onto Floor 24.
His boots dug deep into thick moss, forcing him to a jarring halt. The flooded tunnels of the Water Capital vanished, abruptly replaced by a sprawling vertical maze of petrified trees and towering mushroom caps.
Max quickly scanned the drastic shift in the biome, realizing his previous strategy was now useless. He couldn't simply throw lightning to fry incoming ambushes here; without massive bodies of water acting as a conductor, the area-of-effect would be severely limited against the dense terrain.
Furthermore, searching a floor this massive on foot was no longer viable. Judging by the distance the rat had covered in the short span it took Kairu to summon him, the Evilus operative was moving at desperate speed. Factoring in the trail of monster bait tossed around to slow pursuit, it was obvious the rat wasn't running blindly—he was making a dead sprint for an exit close by.
If Max didn't find him immediately, the bastard would slip through the cracks.
He needed a wider net.
Abandoning the ground, Max used Geppo to bound upward and settle cross-legged on a sturdy branch, taking a single breath to center his focus.
Weaponizing his Magic Sense to blanket the floor risked heavy sensory overload, but it was the only guarantee of finding his target before he slipped away.
Closing his eyes, Max braced himself and expanded his senses, shifting from passive observation to an active sweep.
His mind began to strain once he hit his usual boundary, but he forced it further still, stretching the pulse until it blanketed the entire floor. The feedback hit like a fist to the skull—thousands of monsters, shifting roots, and rushing currents crashing into his mind at once. A white-hot headache detonated behind his eyes.
Gritting his teeth, Max leaned on the mental discipline he had forged while building Gojo, compartmentalizing the overload one layer at a time. He filtered out the beasts first, then muted the ambient churn of the dungeon itself, narrowing his focus until only one texture remained: the foul signature of the zombie.
The headache dulled, and the floor mapped itself behind his eyes like a tactical display. There—deep in the forest's thickest cluster—a festering aura moved fast, then stopped dead in front of a featureless stone wall.
Got you.
A crimson magic circle bloomed beneath him.
VWOOM.
The air cracked as he materialized ten feet behind them. The old rat stood facing the stone, hands hammering frantically against the rock. The last zombie positioned itself between its master and the tunnel, standing guard.
Max didn't hesitate. He raised his left hand, a sphere of Destruction whining in his palm.
"Going somewhere, rat?" he sneered, thrusting the Radial Burst forward.
Basram flinched, nearly tripping over his robes as he spun around with a strangled gasp. But the shock vanished in an instant, replaced by a desperate snarl as he drew a jagged dagger from his vestments. Even before the weapon left the rat's hand, Max's eyes caught the unnatural distortion bleeding off the metal. Something was fundamentally wrong with that blade.
Before he could fully process the threat, the zombie reacted. Moving with first-class agility, it threw its bulk between the blast and its master, taking the hit squarely in the chest.
As the sphere collided with the creature, Basram hurled the corrupted dagger straight into the expanding core of the spell. Max felt the repulsive friction between his magic and the blade, instantly recognizing the foul rot: it carried the exact same necrotic frequency animating the zombie.
The corrupted blade did its job. It destabilized the magic matrix, causing the Radial Burst to unravel. The opposing energies detonated with a deafening crack, releasing a screeching shockwave that ruptured the air. The blast hit with such violent intensity that Max was forced to shut his eyes against the blinding flash.
In the momentary darkness, his ears caught a distinct mechanical click. Stone shifting. A heavy lock pulling free.
Refusing to wait for his sight to return, he tracked the echo, aimed his hand toward the sound, and poured magic into a blind cast.
"Hadō #63. Raikōhō!"
Yellow lightning ripped through the glare, slamming into the spot where the rat was. A pained scream pierced the air, quickly morphing into Basram's frantic voice spilling from the opening passage.
"Apate curse you, fucking heretic!" he shrieked, panic shattering his arrogant facade. "MARK MY WORDS! I'll see you and everyone you hold dear burn for this!"
But the hysterical curses were immediately drowned out as guttural roars rolled down from the canopy overhead. The screeching shockwave and the lightning strike had accomplished what the messy trail never could—they drew the predators.
As the flash bled away, Max opened his eyes to a blank stretch of stone. No seams. No handles. The hidden doors of Knossos had already sealed, leaving the wall looking untouched.
Processing the dead end, the beating of heavy wings drew his attention. A dozen Green Dragons dropped, lowering their heads as their throats flared, ready to incinerate him without a trace.
Accepting that the trail was dead, Max took one last look at the empty stone, burning its exact spatial coordinates into his memory. Next time an Evilus operative crossed his path, there wouldn't be a door fast enough to save them.
A teleportation circle flared quietly under his feet.
VWOOM.
By the time the first dragon loosed its breath, the moss was empty, leaving the beasts to bathe nothing but an abandoned patch of dirt.
-◈ -
Hogni
When the doors finally shattered inward, Hogni's fingers locked around his hilt. Through the settling dust, his crimson eyes caught the vanguard of the Evilus assault: Dina and Vena Dis.
A visceral shudder crawled up his spine. The mere thought of their unhinged matrimonial obsession made him want to submerge his body in cleansing water, a deep-seated revulsion he knew his light-haired counterpart shared.
But the moment Ottar stepped forward, silently isolating the psychotic twins from the group, that suffocating tension bled right out of Hogni's frame. A satisfied smirk curled beneath his scarf.
Finally.
He waited weeks for someone to deliver their reckoning, and no one was better suited for the task than the Warlord who cared absolutely nothing for their simpering advances. Hogni lowered his stance, fully intending to enjoy the execution like a front-row spectator.
Unfortunately, that luxury was violently interrupted.
The rest of the Evilus vanguard poured through the ruined doorway, breaking his line of sight. Hogni clicked his tongue, annoyance bleeding through his relief. He would have to postpone his entertainment. His Mistress's orders echoed with clear clarity in his mind: Slaughter all attackers. Secure any Gods present.
Shelving his personal satisfaction, Hogni turned his blade toward the encroaching grunts. Alongside Allen, the culling played out like a casual warm-up exercise.
That effortless rhythm lasted right up until the kinetic force of Ottar's first swing ruptured the floor.
The tremor slammed up through Hogni's boots, forcing him to widen his footing. As the center of the room began sinking into the level below, the surviving grunts panicked and bolted into the rising smoke. Taking advantage of the lull, Allen dragged a squeaking figure out from behind an overturned table—only to realize the cowering fool was a deity.
A God?
Hogni's brow furrowed beneath his scarf, a wave of genuine awe washing over him. He tried to calculate the amount of stupidity required for a divine being to personally tag along on a vanguard siege. The battlefield offered no mercy to a mortal-bound deity suppressing their divinity. A single stray piece of shrapnel was enough to send them back to Heaven.
Yet, his Mistress explicitly ordered them to secure any gods present.
A devotional pride swelled in his chest. His Goddess hadn't just anticipated an Evilus attack. She possessed the omniscient foresight to know these fools would bring a deity right to Loki's doorstep. Her flawless control over the board only grew more monumental in his eyes.
He let the thought go with an admiring shake of his head, his ears already straining for the first scream to rise from the crater. Ottar was taking his time, which meant the twins were still breathing down there. Good. He wanted them to feel every moment of the execution.
Then, the hair on his arms stood on end.
The air pressure shifted as multiple presences dropped straight through the ruined entrance. Hogni spun on his heel, tracking their descent toward the crater. Suddenly, a cloaked shape launched itself across his path, forcing him to wrench his blade up to block.
Steel met steel with a deafening clang. The shockwave rolled down Hogni's arms and rattled his teeth. He held the lock, his boots skidding backward across the carpet from the crushing weight behind the strike.
Only then did he actually look at what he was holding back.
Rotted skin peeked out from beneath the torn cloak. It stretched over a frame that moved with the jerky rhythm of a marionette on tangled strings. Its eyes held no shine and no fear, just a glassy hunger.
The aura radiating off it was wrong in a way that defied raw strength. It lacked the desperate adrenaline of a living warrior. It felt entirely hollow—like crossing blades with a feral Dungeon monster wearing an adventurer's corpse.
Hogni broke the lock and lunged. He tested the waters, carving a shallow arc across its exposed ribs.
Nothing happened.
No blood sprayed. No scream followed. The blade should have severed muscle, leaving an unhealable wound on its side and dropped the creature to its knees, but it simply kept coming, indifferent to the wound cut into its side.
A cold chill crawled up Hogni's spine. He faced monsters wearing human faces before, but he had never faced a human possessing a monster's silence.
Deciding the anomaly wasn't worth prolonging, Hogni dropped his stance low. He condensed the crimson aura bleeding off Victim Abyss into a single razor edge and stepped directly inside the creature's guard.
"Burn Dain."
The spell left his lips just as a scream finally tore up through the crater behind him. Its raw agony made him delighted. Especially since it belonged to Dina Dis. The Warlord had finally started collecting his due.
The distraction provided the perfect opening. Hogni surged forward and buried his blade to the hilt. He felt the physical resistance give way all at once as the magic detonated deep inside the creature's chest.
But the instant his sword connected, the floor beneath his boots gave a sickening lurch. The manor's structural supports, already screaming from Ottar's assault and the explosions below, finally surrendered. Stone dust rained from the ceiling as the walls buckled inward.
Riding the sudden drop in the floor, Hogni fluidly completed his swing. The condensed arc sheared clean through the creature's torso. The corpse folded into two pieces, vanishing into the collapsing rubble beneath him.
With his immediate obstacle erased, his eyes cut through the falling debris. He spotted the bound deity abandoned near a crumbling support beam. Hogni's eyes gleamed. He would not fail to secure the prize his Mistress had foreseen.
He kicked off a plummeting slab of stone, closed the gap in a blur, and hooked his fingers into the deity's collar just as the ground beneath the god vanished into open air.
Geppo caught beneath his boots. Hogni kicked hard against the emptiness to reverse his momentum. Carving a clean hole through the buckling ceiling with Victim Abyss, he burst out into the night sky, dragging the whimpering deity with him.
He barely cleared the roofline when the darkness ahead flared electric blue.
Hedin's Varian Hildr detonated across the courtyard below. The boom rattled Hogni's ribs even from his aerial height. A heartbeat later, the massive pressure of that spell combined with the failing supports proved too much. The mighty home of the Loki Familia gave a grinding groan and folded inward, swallowing itself in a churning cloud of dust.
Hogni hovered high above the wreckage, kicking the air to hold his position. Below, the smoke thinned just enough to reveal Hedin and the Gullivers regrouping in the courtyard, already shifting into formation against a fresh wave of undead. His counterpart stood at the center of a smoking crater, cold and composed as ever.
Satisfied that his overwatch offered a better tactical advantage than diving back into the fray, Hogni tightened his grip on the squirming god. He channelled his intent through the communication device and once he heard the confirmation, he spoke.
"Maximus," he began, his voice falling back into its unbothered smoothness despite the chaos beneath him. "I have secured a God from the rubble, exactly as our Mistress ordained."
A brief pause broke his theatrical composure, and his grip on Rudra's collar tightened nervously as his true nature bled through.
"Would you... be generous enough to contact her in my stead to report this?" He nervously asked his friend.
-◈ -
General Pov
A crushing weight pinned Vena to the floor, driving the air from her lungs.
As the violent tremors finally ground to a halt, the silence of the ruined manor pressed in. Gritting her teeth against the pain, she braced her boots against the debris and shoved the heavy stone slab off her chest. She gasped for breath, but inhaled only thick dust, triggering a violent fit of coughing that rattled her bruised ribs. But desperation overrode the agony. She dragged her legs free from the rubble, ignoring the sharp masonry slicing her knees open, and scrambled blindly across the shadowed floor.
Dina.
Her fingers scraped across broken stone, searching frantically in the darkness. Then, they slipped which made her check them to find a scalding liquid coating her palms.
Vena stopped breathing.
The settling dust revealed an expanding puddle. As her eyes tracked the dark trail, she saw it flowing outward from a crumpled pile of fabric. Dina's custom silk dress clung wetly to her skin, ruined and soaked entirely black. Vena's gaze darted upward, searching for her sister's face, but her eyes snagged on a horrific impossibility.
Where her sister's left arm should have been, a jagged ruin of white bone and torn muscle pulsed. Fresh arterial blood sprayed the stone with every erratic heartbeat.
Vena's vision tunneled. A high-pitched ringing drowned out the groaning foundation of the manor, and the delusional heat of their planned wedding night instantly curdled into ice. Her chest seized, her lungs completely refusing to take in air.
He broke her.
At that, her jaw snapped shut with enough force to crack a molar. The taste of copper flooded her tongue. This was impossible. Dina was flawless. Dina could not be broken.
HOW DARE HE?
The raw Mind pooled in Vena's core ignited. Bypassing the chant entirely, she thrust her hands toward the ruined ceiling and ripped a feral shriek from her throat.
Fire erupted. The chaotic heat warped the air, instantly vaporizing the falling dust into ash before it could even touch them. The inferno expanded outward like a shockwave, scorching the jagged crater walls black. Vena swept her burning hands through the blaze, her crazed eyes searing through the smoke to find the black pig. She was going to slaughter him. She was going to slaughter everyone precious to him a hundred times over.
But the flames licked only empty air. He wasn't there.
The complete absence of her target hit her harder than a physical blow. The manic rage fueling her magic abruptly fractured, finding nothing to burn. Reality crashed back down over her—heavy and suffocating.
Her legs gave out. Her knees slammed into the bloody stone, and a broken wail tore past her lips. Scalding tears spilled over her lashes, carving clean tracks through the soot on her face as she looked down at her perfect sister, bleeding out in the dirt.
"Ve-na."
The rasping whisper pulled Vena's gaze downward. Dina was clutching her ruined shoulder. Her face lacked all color, looking like cracked porcelain, yet her emerald eyes still held onto that stubborn spark.
"Se-search for my a-arm," Dina commanded, her voice trembling but unnervingly casual. "Find it. We will get back to the base and stitch it back on."
Vena scrambled to obey. Sobbing quietly, she threw heavy chunks of shattered stone aside, her bloody hands frantically sifting through the debris to find the severed limb.
"No need."
A sharp voice cut through the shadows opposite them. Vena instantly tensed. Pulling fresh fire into her palms, her body coiled like a spring, ready to incinerate the returning enemy.
But it was Valletta who stepped out from the settling dust of the collapsed corridor. Her dark cloak was torn, her face smeared with ash from the fall, but her posture remained unyielding. Tucked firmly under the human's arm was Dina's severed limb, its bloody fingers brushing lifelessly against her hip.
"Get ready to drag your sorry asses down to the sewers," Valletta ordered coldly. "We are leaving immediately."
The oppressive terror gripping Vena loosened slightly at the sight of their commander, but that relief instantly mutated into rabid indignation. Vena's pride violently rejected the idea of retreating like a beaten dog.
"I want to kill him!" Vena screamed, the fire flaring dangerously hot in the dim light. "I want to carve him apart and feed him to that whore!"
Valletta did not care. She stepped forward, ignoring the lethal heat radiating from the elf's hands. The human leveled a glare so devoid of empathy that it made Vena's volatile magic physically stutter.
"I have sacrificed half a battalion to save your miserable lives, you dumb whore," Valletta hissed, her voice cutting through the cavern like a blade. "Do not make me abandon you now."
The threat landed heavier than Ottar's greatsword. The ice in Valletta's eyes promised indifference. Vena knew the commander would leave them to bleed to death in this crater without a second thought if she pressed and when she looked down at Dina's pale face, realizing there was no time left for pride.
The fire died in Vena's palms. She clamped her mouth shut, her survival instinct finally overpowering her tantrum.
Satisfied the rabid mutts had submitted, Valletta outlined the escape.
"Ottar is busy with the Spirit Soldier I sent to the north wing. It will buy us a few minutes at most," Valletta explained, tossing a bundle of dark fabric at Vena's feet. "Put the concealing cloaks on. Follow me through the sewers. Do not make a sound. Understood?"
Vena swallowed the bitter ash in her mouth and nodded. She draped one cloak over Dina's trembling shoulders, hauled her crippled sister upright with a heavy grunt of effort, and pulled the second cloak over her own head.
Valletta took the lead. She navigated the ruins with ruthless efficiency, guiding the wounded elves away from the clashing steel that still echoed through the manor grounds. They slipped into the alleyways, moving like ghosts, until Valletta stopped and pried open a rusted iron grate.
They descended into the stagnant waters of Orario's underbelly.
The thick stench of the sewers mercifully masked the metallic tang of Dina's blood. Nobody spoke. The adrenaline finally faded from Vena's veins, leaving only a grueling march through the knee-deep sludge. She carried almost all of her sister's dead weight. Her boots slipped repeatedly on the slick stone, every agonizing step a bitter reminder of their failure, until the brick walls finally gave way to the labyrinthine tunnels of Daedalus Street, and eventually, the reinforced corridors of Knossos.
Valletta maintained her icy composure for the entire march. But the moment the heavy vault door sealed shut behind them, locking them safely inside the Evilus stronghold, the safety catch snapped.
Valletta ripped her cloak off. She spun around and slapped Vena squarely across the face.
The sharp crack echoed off the stone walls. Before Vena could even register the stinging heat on her cheek, Valletta struck Dina as well, uncaring of the elf's mutilated shoulder.
"You shortsighted bitches," Valletta snarled, pacing furiously in front of them as the stress of the extraction finally boiled over. "You didn't even coordinate an exit strategy! And now we've lost Rudra as well."
Vena clutched her stinging face. She kept her head down, desperately supporting Dina's sagging weight as she stared at the stone floor.
"Because of your incompetence, we are short nine elite Spirit Soldiers and whatever leverage Rudra might have provided us," Valletta spat. "This entire operation was a failure the second that idiot deity decided to go through it."
Vena remained silent. The humiliation burned worse than the slap, but she had no argument left to give. The Warlord had broken their plan, and their commander saved them.
Valletta stopped her pacing. She stared down at the two ruined elves.
Dina leaned heavily against her sister, her dress soaked black, her face the color of chalk. Vena refused to look up, trembling with suppressed rage and sheer defeat.
As Valletta took in the pathetic sight, the frantic stress of the extraction began to recede, rapidly replaced by a vindictive satisfaction. Two Level 5s. The untouchable fairies and top officers of the Apate Familia, dragged back to the sewers like beaten dogs.
It was undeniable proof. This was exactly what happened when the faction's muscle ignored her brain.
Valletta's mind immediately calculated the political shift. She could weaponize this disaster. With the Dis sisters utterly humbled, and Rudra entirely removed from the board, the rest of the squabbling wretches in the alliance would have no choice but to fall in line. This failure gave her the leverage required to maintain complete control over the coalition until Erebus finally returned to the city.
She pulled Dina's severed arm from beneath her cloak and tossed it onto a nearby supply crate. The limb hit the wood with a wet thud. Both sisters flinched.
Valletta leaned in, ensuring they felt the crushing weight of their dependency.
"Look at yourselves," Valletta sneered, ruthlessly rubbing the salt into their open wounds. "Orario's worst nightmares, reduced to bleeding meat because you thought you could out-swing the Warlord. Let this be a lesson to you and Apate both. Next time I draft a strategy, you follow it to the letter, or I leave you in the dirt."
She let the threat hang in the damp air of the tunnel. Neither sister dared to speak back.
Satisfied that the hierarchy was firmly reestablished, Valletta sighed. She rubbed her temples to ward off an encroaching migraine, her pragmatism taking over once more.
"Go find the healers," Valletta ordered, her voice flattening into a strict command. "Get that stitched back on. We will convene shortly to assess the damage Freya's monsters inflicted on us tonight.
-◈ -
Max
The crimson circle faded, depositing Max back on Floor 25 with a low hum.
Annoyance tightened his jaw. Losing the rat to a hidden exit after chasing him across two floors left a sour taste in his mouth, but the frustration vanished the moment he looked down the corridor.
Kairu was on a rampage.
The slime bounced between the cavern walls, tearing through a fresh wave of dungeon spawns. He treated the tunnel like an arcade game. Sweeping a massive scythe through the air, Kairu cleaved monsters in half, caught them mid-flight, and swallowed them whole before gravity could pull him.
Max stopped, raising an eyebrow at the sheer absurdity of the sight. The scythe itself was a work of art—a core of dense dungeon metal wrapped in a jagged blade of black ice that hummed with a lethal chill.
"Look at you," Max mused. "Turning into the Grim Reaper behind my back."
Kairu froze mid-swing. The slime wobbled, looking almost self-conscious as he lowered the scythe, before puffing out his gelatinous chest and offering a proud "Ki!"
Before Max could ask to inspect the toy, a pulse hummed in his mind.
He accepted the communication request.
"M-Max? Are you there?"
"I'm here," Max answered. "How's everything going there?"
"The m-manor came down," Hogni said, stumbling slightly over the syllables. "But I got him. The God Rudra is secured in the ruins. H-he's tied up." A pause stretched over the line. Max could practically hear the dark elf shifting nervously from foot to foot. "Could you... maybe call Lady Freya for me?"
An amused grin spread across Max's face. "What's the matter, Hogni? You just carved through Evilus, but you're too shy to give the boss the good news?"
"I-it's not that!" Hogni stammered, his anxiety immediately flaring. "It's just... she's so radiant, and my brain forgets how words work when she addresses me! I d-don't want to sound stupid to her. You're better at this than me!"
Max laughed, shaking his head. "Alright, relax, man. I got it."
He switched the mental channel, bridging a line straight to Babel. "Lady Freya. Rudra is in custody. Hogni pulled him out of the collapse."
"Excellent," Freya's melodic voice answered instantly. "Send the rat straight to my location. The Denatus is currently in session, and Loki is eager to receive her guest."
"On it."
Max focused his mind, locking onto Freya's signature and channeled his magic into a precise link, opening a purple teleportation circle under Hogni and the whimpering God.
VWOOM.
The spatial link shut, swallowing Rudra and transferring the captive straight into the Denatus chamber.
With the surface business settled, Max lowered his arm and turned his attention back to his familiar.
Kairu bounced forward, jiggling with excitement. Extending a thick pseudopod, the slime held out the chilled handle of the scythe, nudging it against Max's hand as if begging him to take the creation for a test run.
Max chuckled, wrapping his fingers around the grip. "Alright, buddy. Let's see what this thing can do."
-◈ -
Ganesha
A purple matrix flared in front of the dias, dumping a bound figure onto the marble with a heavy thud.
Watching the spatial magic dissipate sent a spike of adrenaline through Ganesha's chest. Freya warned him this was coming, but seeing the instantaneous transport execute perfectly right in front of him made it real. It thrilled him as it reminded him of his core purpose as a deity—to protect the masses from chaos. He fully intended to track Maximus down and thank the mortal personally for orchestrating such a decisive strike against Evilus.
The sound of shattering porcelain yanked him out of his thoughts.
The spatial intrusion shattered the pantheon's composure. Deities scrambled over their benches, knocking over wine goblets and tripping over their robes as they shoved each other in panic.
Ganesha planted his boots into the stone. He filled his lungs, let the air build, and forced it out in a booming roar.
"I AM GANESHA!"
The volume hit the scrambling gods like a physical wall. The pandemonium died instantly. As the deities settled back into their seats, clearing their ringing ears, they looked down at him with eager anticipation. That sight made him smile beneath his elephant mask. He loved the masses. Restoring order and bringing them joy fueled his very existence.
Ready to address the assembly, he stepped down from the podium and knelt beside the trembling intruder. He gripped the glowing gag clamped between the man's teeth and yanked it free. Ganesha drew a breath to introduce himself, only for a spray of blood and spit to cut him off.
"YOU COCK WORSHIPPING WHORE!"
The shriek ripped through the quiet chamber. The bound god thrashed against his restraints, twisting his neck to aim his venom directly at Freya.
"IF NOT FOR YOUR NIPPLE-NIBBLING CUCKS' INTERVENTION, I WOULD HAVE GOTTEN MY REVENGE ON THIS WASHBOARD CUNT!" He jerked his chin toward Loki. "IT'S ALL BECAUSE OF YOU! YOU!! YOU!!!"
In the front row, Freya simply crossed her legs. Beside her, Loki rested her chin on her knuckles. Neither goddess twitched. They stared at the screaming deity like he was nothing more than an ugly stain on the carpet.
Ganesha however, couldn't maintain the same apathy. He leaned over and gave the screaming god a gentle tap on the head.
The strike made the deity cease his hysterical screaming. He blinked and looked up. As if he wasn't done, he opened his mouth to spew more nonsense, but Ganesha's demeanor changed. Peering through the grime, he recognized the pest.
Rudra's hysterical screaming ceased instantly. He choked on his own breath, looking up in paralyzing terror. He opened his mouth to spew more venom, but Ganesha's entire demeanor shifted. The boisterous mascot was gone, replaced by Orario's enforcer of laws.
"I would advise caution, Rudra." He kept his voice calm. "You are here to be judged. Irrespective of the verdict, I will make you wish you never fell into the ways of destruction and colluded with Evilus."
Ganesha was sure his face looked normal beneath the mask, but Rudra understood the predatory threat perfectly. The Evilus god snapped his mouth shut, trembling against the floor.
With the rot contained, Ganesha straightened his spine. The heavy aura vanished. He threw his arms wide.
"I AM GANESHA!" he cheered in joy.
He looked toward the stands, where his colleagues had begun swarming Loki and Freya. They paused mid-step, looking down at him.
"We shall decide the fate of this," he declared, unwilling to even share the pest's name. He bypassed the usual procedure of collective decision-making entirely. "Loki. What do you want to do?"
No one objected. Everyone had gotten the gist of what happened by now.
Loki stared at the tied bundle of rags on the floor. She remained quiet, her mind wrestling with the choice. Ganesha found her hesitation interesting; he assumed her verdict would be immediate and decisive. After a long moment, she finally spoke.
"Send him back to Tenkai," Loki ordered, her voice devoid of its usual slang. "He is unworthy of standing on the same earth as my children."
Ganesha offered a solemn nod, preparing to summon the Guild guards.
"But not yet," Loki added. Her vermillion eyes drilled into Rudra's skull at this. "Keep him in the deepest cell you have. After my children return from the dungeon, I want them to watch him burn. I want them to see retribution for the acts of this bastard and his gang of lunatics."
That promise of delayed execution shattered whatever fragile sanity Rudra had left.
"KEKEKEKEKEKEKE!"
A wet, unhinged cackle erupted from his chest. Rudra thrashed against the magic bindings, scraping his bruised face against the polished stone as his mind finally broke.
"YOU IGNORANT IMBECILES!" Rudra shrieked, spittle flying from his lips as he glared at the pantheon above him. "IT DOESN'T MATTER! SEND ME BACK! EXECUTE ME! NOTHING YOU DO MATTERS ANYMORE! EVERYTHING WILL BURN AND GO BACK TO HOW IT SHOULD BE! IHEHEHEHEHEHE!"
His unhinged laughter echoed through the vaulted ceiling, bleeding into a pathetic promise of revenge from a god whose game had already ended.
--> Devil in a Dungeon <--
AN:
Apologies for the delay folks. I read through the chapter and couldn't stomach how it felt and so I sat and edited all of it and this version is the one that satisfied me the best and I didn't want to delay it any longer as well. So if the quality dropped a bit, you know why.
Coming to the chapter, we finally see the conclusion of almost everything that was loose in the last chapter and I was thinking of writing a Loki Expedition pov, but unsure if I should make a proper chapter or a side chapter like Lili's.
And Kairu got a scythe now... Unsure where he got the inspiration from lmao. He also felt very hesitant to give it to Max, hmmm.
Finally, Ganesha, he was very fun to write honestly and was a breath of fresh air. Hope I managed to capture his personality well. Also do you think Loki has another reason for not sending Rudra to Tenkai immediately??
The next chapter, we will jump directly to status updates as I don't want to drag it any longer unless something comes up after everyone is rested and Loki decides to squat in Freya's Sanctum in Babel ;)
Do share how you felt the chapter was. Did Rudra felt like too much? Please share your feedback/suggestions on how to improve the story in a comment/review.
If you'd like to read 10 chapters ahead(around 50k words), support my work, check character images for free, read a free chapter(Ch 51.5), or commission a story idea, visit my p.a.t.r.e.o.n.c.o.m/b3smash
Please note that the chapters are early access only, they will be eventually released here as well.
Next update will be on Tuesday.
Ben, Out.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything.
Kairu with his Scythe:
The first one how is looks, like liquid mercury took form and obviously Kairu looking smug and elated
You can take the below as how his scythe looks with his Ice magic:
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