He was sleeping with a peaceful face, as if a bed had been set up in midair and he was lying upon it.
A pure white saintess robe and a circlet engraved with Alte's emblem.
Sitri had infiltrated inside and was watching that appearance.
"We made a promise, didn't we, Sitri."
Ferda warned coldly.
Get off right now.
Sitri paid no heed to Ferda's words, busy taking in Olivia with her eyes.
"You know, oppa?"
She said.
Her finger pointed at Olivia.
It didn't touch.
Meaning she was keeping the contract.
"The Arken clan are beautiful porcelains that Silverwind created with an amusing idea. They were made quite secretly so it went unnoticed for a long time. Well, there's no such thing as an eternal secret. Right?"
"....."
"Who in the world would think to create humans with an archdemon's blood? Which bastard would dare touch the demon realm?"
Sitri's snake body moved as if it might touch Olivia, then might not.
"Still, it was fun to watch. Whose blood would the successor inherit to become emperor? We even placed bets on that. The sure thing is mine turned out the most useless."
She frowned deeply, displeased.
Illusion and lust.
As long as the Alte Order valued piety, she couldn't recklessly use that nature.
It was a good ability for piercing others, but the problem was it couldn't produce a successor.
"The strongest among past emperors was Godfrey, the king you killed, oppa. He was the sole avatar of Baal. The ability to see the future and respond. He used that to ruthlessly crush his kin, didn't he? Strangely, the capable father had no thought of sharing with his children, so only worthless kids came outâtruly pitiful."
Alexander who had transformed into Morax's form.
Ureas who had transformed into Amon's form.
Whether Ureas or Alexander, they had outstanding parts as humans but were severely lacking as royalty.
"But in the end, she didn't disappoint?"
Sitri's forked tongue licked Olivia's cheek.
"I thought mine would be the worst, but who could've imagined she'd create something this beautiful and luscious?"
"Congratulations. Your blood survived to the end. So get lost now? Aren't you worried about your Life Vessel?"
Sitri had made a contract.
If he returned Olivia unharmed, he would return Sitri's Life Vessel.
It was embedded in Penelope's body, and returning it would ultimately make living in Hestia difficult, but that wasn't Ferda's concern.
"Right, the Life Vessel. That's really important. It's the object that constitutes my life."
Sitri was a demon who had used every trick to get it back.
Right now, at this moment, there would be nothing sweeter than that deal.
But for demons, there's no such thing as a forced choice between two alternatives.
If there are two options, they just try to take both.
Choosing only one is solely when there's no need to bear that much risk.
And right now?
"Right now I'm bargaining with your life, Sitri. No need to be consumed by the desire to make Olivia your avatar, right?"
Right now he was bargaining with Sitri's life.
Yet Sitri only tried to taste Olivia's face with a face full of ecstasy.
"Avatar? You think I'd just use this child as an avatar? Our oppa still has a long way to go."
"What?"
Sitri grinned.
Disgust rose instinctively.
"Let me tell you one thing. This child isn't a simple avatar. Does she match my body? No. This child's body contains the blood of all demons."
"Olivia's a mongrel?"
"If it were a hodgepodge of random nobodies' blood you'd call it that, but this should be called a grand unification."
The more she spoke, the more her eyes clouded with obsession.
Desire grew alongside it.
"A body spoken of as legend even among archdemons."
Sitri spoke that name softly.
"Black Sun......"
Black Sun.
Called the sign of the Serdes Continent's destruction, the existence the Alte Order's people fear most.
Ferda had heard those words before.
From the Saintess of the Full Moon, Angrem.
"If this child someday reveals her true light...... She'll surely be destined to encompass and reign over all of Hell!"
All manner of emotions flashed across Sitri's face.
Anger at the sacrilege of reigning over Hell, and greed wanting to possess that charm.
Whether to tear her apart and devour her, or lick her,
She trembled as if she didn't know herself, continuing her words.
"But...... reigning over us? You think we'd just let that slide?"
What could be felt in Sitri's eyes was pure longing.
Even having risen to an archdemon's seat, she wasn't satisfied.
Rather, the fact that her power only reached that district was unsatisfactory.
All archdemons were like that.
Greed is like salt waterâthe more you drink, the more thirst rushes in.
She'd finally discovered salt water to quench that thirst.
Ferda raised his hand to such a Sitri.
Emitting magical power, he warned lowly.
"Final warning. Let go and fuck off, Sitri."
But Sitri just sneered at Ferda.
And finally, her hand touched Olivia.
"I'm going to become Olivia now, oppa."
She rubbed her cheek and smiled.
Like a victory ceremony.
No, that's probably exactly what it was.
An archdemon doesn't do such a thing unless certain of victory.
"That worthless daughter's Life Vessel, use it all you want. From now on I'll use this bitch's body. Because I'll become the new master of this Serdes and the great Demon King encompassing all of Hell!"
Only then did he understand a little.
The inescapable fate Godfrey spoke of.
What the fate was that he'd walked countless futures but couldn't change.
'Olivia of the Black Sun......'
Olivia is a woman who will reign over Hell no matter what.
Even if not, the seven archdemons would have toyed with her, tried to make her their new avatar, and a terrible fate was unavoidable.
The reason Olivia secluded herself from birth was because she'd tried to find a future escaping those demons' hands, and when such a future wasn't visible, she showed herself at the end.
That was the responsibility he bore as one father and as everyone's emperor.
Godfrey never once abandoned his weight.
When he finally laid everything down, it was because he had conviction.
Conviction that he would save Olivia.
Ferda asks himself.
Am I really that kind of person?
Then something squirmed within Ferda's circle.
A surge rising in reaction to emotion?
'What feelings do I harbor for Olivia?'
No.
That movement has a different quality from emotional turmoil.
As if it weren't happening from Ferda's bodyâheterogeneous.
This strange, unfamiliar sensation might help in this situation.
And his instinct was right.
That movement wasn't rising from his chest but was resonance from vibration.
Ferda's soul,
Godwin's essence that had assimilated,
Shares wavelength and vibration with a voice from across dimensions.
"Give up now! Everything is in my grasp!"
Sitri's victory declaration continued, but Ferda listened to that voice.
They whispered.
When the whisper put a period, Ferda lifted his eyes.
"Demon of Lust and Illusion, Sitri."
He stared at Sitri clearly.
"You've made a grave mistake."
"What?"
Sitri thought it was mere bluffing.
Ferda placed his hand in empty air.
Then, darknesses hiding from light particles condensed like sticky tar in Ferda's hand, shaping form.
What was finally created was a black book.
Ferda knows this book.
Sitri knew it too.
-Barbatos's Shadow Grimoire...... So that's the famous magic book?
Sitri looked at the book as if trivial, mocking Ferda.
-Did you forget what I said? Barbatos doesn't exist. You're going to summon a demon that doesn't exist?
"Still don't get it?"
Ferda asks Sitri who denies it so.
Then the air changed in an instant.
Sitri couldn't say a word.
Precisely, she was being crushed.
By that book.
It was a strange feeling.
What could be felt from that book was a sensation she'd felt once before.
Even archdemons have times they make mistakes.
When the arrogance that no one in Hell can surpass them dominates the body.
It was the feeling from that time.
Blinded by that arrogance, the sensation of belatedly noticing the blade digging into the heart.
"Still don't get it?"
Ferda's eyes shone faintly.
"Barbatos exists."
-That bastard is nothing but a non-existent illusion!
A scream seized by fear.
"I made you believe so."
The pages of the book on Ferda's hand turn over.
With not a breath of wind, they move with a rustling sound, the contents within emitting light.
"He hid his form to the end to deceive you all."
All pages turn, and blue light leaks from inside the book.
"His legacy endured for thousands of years, waiting patiently. For just one chance."
The book floated in midair.
Black darkness, blue light bursting from within as if to explode.
"And finally the chance came. Thanks to your declaration."
Ferda passes sentence on her.
"Farewell. Arrogant demon."
At that moment, a stinging pain rose from Sitri's right hand.
She turned her headâthere was a harpoon.
-This......!?
The harpoon's end was tied with a black rope, and that rope extended from behind Ferda, from a darkness passage.
Sssrrruk!
With a sound of unrestrained winding, the harpoon's barb caught the back of her hand.
It tried to pull her in just like that.
-Something like this......!
Sitri decisively cut off her own hand.
In that situation, it was the best method.
She decided because she knew trying to pull it out would bring disaster.
But simply cutting it wasn't the end.
Harpoon holes that had pierced her hand opened around her body, and harpoons shot out, piercing her everywhere.
-Aaaaaagh!!
Sitri's form splits. She creates dozens, hundreds of illusions to hide herself.
But the fixed rope pulls strongly, and her form returns to one.
-How dare......! How dare!!
Sitri tries to tear it off somehow but it doesn't budge.
When she was finally bound, a large gate opened before Ferda.
A door opened from the demon realm.
But what was visible inside was pitch-black darkness and a damp smell.
A space well-known to archdemons.
-The Abyss......?
A place demons don't even glance at.
Even in Hell, a place where untouchables fall, treated as a trash bin.
Something walked out from there toward here.
Damp, fishy smell and a shabby coat.
A bandit mask and blazing blue eyes.
On his shoulder rested a large butcher's hook.
-How dare......! How dare you lowlifes look straight at me!?
Sitri shouted in indignation.
Not the arrogance of nobility, but anger from the sense of disparity at being unable to accept this situation.
-Fuck off right now! You lower trash! How dare you......!!
That man listened to no more words.
Instead, he drove the hook into her chest.
-Aaaaaagh!!
Sitri's scream follows.
The hook emitting murky energy pierced her chest and caught fast.
At the same time, the butchering began.
Countless hands emerged from within the gate, drawing knives to shred Sitri's body.
At a glance, they were rusted, unmaintained knives, so they couldn't cleanly sever in one go.
They couldn't cut cleanly, but were perfectly suited for inflicting pain.
-Aaaaaaaagh!! Aaaaaaa!!
Sitri's screams got tangled in the sounds of flesh and bone being crushed.
Her shattered body parts were sucked into the Abyss depths, and finally only her head remained.
On the head was a vulgar expression unbefitting the archdemon of lust.
Ferda looked down at it silently, and Sitri's eyes trembled as she looked at Ferda.
-Ferda...... Valdrova......
She poured out a final curse.
-You're making a huge mistake. How long will you live pretending not to know that this woman is the mastermind behind all this? As long as this bitch lives...... You'll never be happy. Forever...... foreve-!
Crunch!
The man from Hell stomped on that head as if refusing to listen.
Sitri's powerless body cracked and shattered, turning to ash and scattering.
Today, one archdemon met death in this place.
"....."
The being from the Abyss turned its body toward Ferda.
Blue-glowing eyes.
Within them, countless souls' names brushed past.
Though forming a figure in one body, he was not singular.
Just from that presence, an archdemon of the Abyss.
One worthy of being called Barbatos who had hidden himself for a long time.
But Ferda knew.
This one, no, they were not Barbatos.
Ferda knew Barbatos's true name.
'Godwin.'
Godwin loved Valdrova.
He loved everything Valdrova loved.
So even if he disappeared from this world, he needed beings who could protect her.
Godwin threw himself into Hell.
He went to the Abyss, called the trash bin of Hell.
Those in the Abyss were things no one coveted, insignificant things not even their souls were honored.
Dust sunk deep in a lake, never to be called by anyone, sinking forever.
Godwin treated them kindly.
To him, all souls were equal, and he faced and embraced their suffering with the same gaze.
The unacknowledged insignificant beings slowly recall their names.
In the deep darkness, the less dark became light for the world, and Godwin was the only light.
So they arbitrarily gave Godwin a name.
King of the Abyss, Barbatos.
But Godwin did not reign.
Instead, he asked one thing.
Protect the world where the woman I love exists.
When the archdemons who abandoned you covet this world, save it.
The souls answered.
The fallen, torn souls naturally bound as one will.
Most say this.
Dust gathered is still just dust.
But a great mountain too is ultimately made of single sand grains.
Hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands...... beyond that, hundreds of millions gathered and became one.
Those who realized that became beings no less than archdemons.
And they called themselves a legion.
From the Abyss floor, they waited for archdemons to let their guard down, preparing blades of revenge.
That was today.
Ferda recalled the memories with Godwin and those who were with him.
And placing a hand on his chest, he paid them respect.
The legion saluted Ferda in return.
Then they returned to where they came from.
Everything passed as if natural.
The savior who had already vanished.
For their one and only king, who would forever be their only one.
They would wait again in the Abyss for the time.
Everything disappeared.
Ferda quietly raised Olivia's body.
Olivia, sprawled on the floor, opened her eyes.
Sitri was nowhere to be seen.
She clearly remembered the thing that had coveted her body, and the thing she'd tried to drive to the far side of her heart.
Yet being able to open her eyes normally meant the demon had withdrawn.
Only one great man could achieve such a feat.
And he entered Olivia's two eyes.
"Ferda-nim......"
A voice soaked in affection called that name.
Gray hair, blue eyes.
What surges in this chestâwhether sacrilege or reverenceâcould not be known.
He carefully raised Olivia.
Olivia held her confused head and asks.
"The emperor......?"
"It's over. Everything......"
"I see."
"Now we just need to escape."
The priests who had played in demons' hands were dead, and the emperor was dead too.
The empire will collapse now.
Yet Olivia instinctively sensed.
That it wasn't over yet.
The seal on the back of her hand.
It had been created as a vow of revenge against the Arken clan that went against Alte's doctrine.
Even with all the Arken clan dead, that seal still remained in its place.