When Darius got to the mansion, he was expecting more fire.

As it stood, the building itself was completely fine, if you excluded the kicked in door.

"God. Do you think they're all right?"

He looked over his shoulder to his right to see Evelyn staring down the mansion with an entire cocktail of emotions. There was a bit of sadness, a touch of anger, and a whole handful of worry.

"Well considering that its devils that we're dealing with, they're either dead or being used as a hostage."

That seemed to shake her out of her funk cocktail as she glared at him.

"You're such an asshole."

She was right about that one.

"Well enough dawdling around, how about we go in and… entertain the guests."

He didn't bother to wait for her, opting to simply make his way up to the front door and waltz right in.

"Hello? You do know that waiting for your guests outside the entrance hall is rude right?"

He could here faint whispers on the right, which meant that they were in the ballroom.

"What are you doing!? We had the element of surprise, but now you've gone and messed it up!"

Ah yes, the tag along.

"Well what exactly is the point of that when they obviously knew we were coming?"

She just growled slightly and crossed her arms, saying some very rude words under her breath.

Ignoring her bad vibes, Darius waltzed his way towards the ballroom doors before shoving them open and strutting in, revealing the mastermind behind the entire attack.

'Why is there a twelve-year-old on a throne?'

The kid really didn't look like he could be anything other than twelve, and the tacky black crown and serious face he was trying to put on wasn't helping.

"Welcome foolish hero, I am Ogmar the Demon King and I have accepted your challenge!"

The squeaky voice belonging to the child fit him perfectly well, in the sense that it fit how annoying this whole situation was.

"Why are you twelve?"

That seemed to crack the child's composure, as he began to sputter and spout random nonsense.

"I-I'm twelve and a half! Stop making fun of me!"

"Are you alright my king? Do you need a juice box?"

Looking to the side of the ballroom, he made notice of a head peaking out of one of the side doors.

"Gerald you weren't supposed to come out yet! Now my entire monologue is shot!"

"My apologies milord. Is that a no on the juice box?"

"… Gimmie."

The byplay between the child and what seemed to be his servant stunned Darius for a bit longer than he'd admit, the sound of Evelyn whispering "The fuck?" being what made him snap out of his stupor.

"What the hell is going on right now?"

The kid sighed and made a motion with his hand, seemingly calling his servants to come over. And come over they did.

The first to arrive was the Gerald guy from earlier, and it seemed he was more of a butler than regular servant. His hair having gone gray with age and his face had its fair share of wrinkles.

The next two were a bit stranger, as they shared a body. It looked like Siamese twins, with two heads on one body. They were female and were much closer to his age than the butlers.

The final servant was a beast of a man, with armor covering him from head to toe. The armor made him think of a less spiky and lamer Battleborn, though the giant polearm he wielded did give him pause.

"You may have killed the other members of my peerage, but those were simple pawns! The rest of my peerage, as you can clearly see, is much more powerful than those wretches you slew!"

It was at this point that Evelyn decided that she had seen enough. "Where is my family kid?"

"I was getting to that! When my pawn came back to me frightened out of his mind and bearing the news of your challenge, I was certainly surprised. I mean, how was I supposed to find you in order to accept such a bold proposition? However, my rook over here recognized your name, Antitezo. It was a simple matter of searching for your residence after we knew that, and we thought we'd make ourselves at home. Of course, the occupants were made an example of. Gerald, bring them in."

Ignoring Evelyn's glare of accusation, Darius looked on with mild interest as his family was brought out to reveal-

"Oh my God."

Not how he would've put it, but close enough.

The father had been turned into a strange tentacle hentai monster, his body being a writhing mass of tentacles and teeth. The only semblance of humanity left was the head, which was left suspiciously intact.

The mother was tall and spindly, a departure from her once short body. Her limbs seemed less organic and more wooden and there were long arms with clawed hands on her back. Her head was mostly the same, with the exception of bug-like mandibles ripping through her skin.

And Melody…

Oh God not Melody.

Her skin had paled to the point where it looked almost gray, and her hands and feet were clawed. Her mouth had been replaced by what looked like a speaker, and her eyes were a milky white.

Darius could feel a lump in his throat as he saw them, emotions that weren't his filled his mind, and clouded his thoughts.

"User! Snap out if it!"

She was right, now was not the time to lose his composure, all he had to do was calm down and-

"YOU SON OF A BITCH!"

Evelyn looked as if she were barely holding herself back from throttling Ogmar with his own crown.

"Hmmph, rude. Once you're done with these beasts, use this runestone. It will teleport you to my lair where I will await your arrival."

That seemed to set her off, as she shot off with full murderous intent towards the kid, only for him to teleport away with his peerage. The only thing left being the runestone he mentioned.

The kid's disappearance seemed to cause a chain reaction as suddenly mutated versions of the staff the house had been equipped with burst into the room and began to charge at them.

…

A million thoughts whirled through Evelyn's head as she watched the soon to be dead kid vanished to what she assumed to be the underworld. Most of them being variations of 'I'm going to kill that mother fucker.' And the likes.

"Hey Evelyn, I get you're mad and all that, but we've got company."

And then there was that asshole.

Pushing away what anger she held towards it for the moment, she grabbed the runestone and began to focus on her surroundings. The staff had also been mutated it seems, which was fine for her. She needed to let off some steam.

She charged forward with a yell, all the while activating her gear and punching through the skull of the nearest beast.

Faker leapt over her and landed on another, crushing its skull on the ballroom floor.

"Looks like we're in this together sis."

"can you stop calling me that!? You're not my brother, you are just a faker who took his body!"

She pointed a finger at an opposing monster, before electrocuting it and spinning around to kick another through the sternum.

"Come on now, there is no reason to be rude. I'm more than just a faker ya know?"

She grabbed a nearby beast and used it as a club to beat another one to death.

"Oh? Then what are you exactly?"

Her spite was palpable, and it seemed the faker noticed, as it grinned slightly as it jammed its hand into the chest of another creature.

"I'm a person just like you Evelyn, and I prefer to be called Darius ya know?"

She snorted at that one. Slashing her arm to the side, she watched in satisfaction as three of them were cut down by her ultra-sharp winds.

"I'm not gonna call you that."

It shrugged, before aiming behind her and shooting what looked like a spike of bone out of his hand at something behind her. Turning back, she saw a body fall with a thud, a bone spike in its skull.

"Then I guess you can call me… Hex. Yeah, that'll work."

There were only a few left, so she decided to try and get them all in one fell swoop. Just as she went in for another wind slash, the self-proclaimed Hex lobbed a fire ball at the spell, causing the slash to become engulfed in flames and burn its targets.

"…Fine. I'll call you Hex."

It grinned even wider, and she felt her annoyance flare up again. Just before she could act on it, she noticed that they were missing some.

"Seems like the… family decided to leave the ballroom."

Yeah, that sounds about right.

Her hands shook at the prospect of having to kill her family, a thought that seemed to have been plaguing her for the past few weeks.

"Why don't you go on ahead Evelyn, I'll clean up over here."

Hex's voice was as annoyingly flippant as usual, but there almost seemed to be a tinge of worry coloring it that threw her off a bit.

"Fine. Just be quick asshole."

…

Watching Evelyn leave the ballroom, Darius sighed slightly. The fact that he was fighting people who had been mutated into monsters by an inhuman creature would have brought a laugh to his lips, had it not been at his expense.

"Are you alright User?"

"I'm fine CASI, just trying to focus over Antitezo's emotions."

Dragging the bodies of the monsters he had just slain with Evelyn; he began to consume them as quickly as possible.

'What can you tell me about this kid's powers?'

"Not much unfortunately. It seems to be like yours however, just far stronger."

He had figured that out by the time the staff came in. Biting down on one of the last bodies, he stopped for a moment.

Someone was playing music from back where they came from.

Rushing to the entrance hall, Darius fervently examined the area, straining his ear in order to here the melody. The stairs, it was coming from up the stairs.

Booking it up the stairs, he followed the music towards the end of the left hallway. Unsurprisingly enough, the music was coming from the music room, the source of said music also didn't shock him very much.

"Dad… Melody."

His head began to pound, and he quickly forced some bone out of his skin in order focus on what had to be done.

There both Melody and father could be found. Melody sitting on the man's shoulders as he shuffled across the room. the music he had heard was coming from the speaker that was Melody's mouth. She turned her head towards him, and then wailed.

It was a haunting sound and was definitely not something he wanted to keep hearing. Steeling his heart, he lifted and arm and shot a bone spike at her head, only for a tentacle to get in the way and take the hit.

Looks like dear old dad was pissed.

The hentai monster that was now his father charged him, rape tentacles all aimed at him.

Quickstepping to the side, Darius shot a bone spike towards the mass, only for it to do no damage.

"Well that's not go-NO, MONSTER-DONO! YAMETE!"

Tentacles grabbed him and hoisted him up by his arms, before another few gathered together and merged into a larger bladed one.

'Battleborn help!'

Just before Darius could get stabbed in the chest a second time, an armored fist came and decked the monster in the face, throwing it through the wall alongside, with him along for the ride.

Freeing himself from the tentacles, Darius blinked the dust from his eyes and looked around. Shelves lined the walls, and a few crates were scattered across the room. it seems that they landed in the storage room.

"Battleborn, get Melody off of his shoulders."

The summon nodded and took off to do exactly as he asked. Darius himself cracked his neck before sprinting in the direction of the creature and going for a right hook.

The attack made the beast stumble for a bit, and it was then that Battleborn capitalized on the moment and snagged Melody.

Just as everything was going according to plan, Melody wailed again and the cock-up cascade began.

…

Evelyn's luck was not good today it seemed.

Barely dodging the clawed hand being thrust at her, she bit her lip as the face of her mother looked at her, its eyes empty.

Funnily enough, she had found what remained of her mother in the kitchen. It wasn't as funny when it started to attack her.

The spindly body added to its already impressive speed, and she was having trouble keeping up. There wasn't much strength behind its blows, but the sharpness of its claws definitely didn't do her any favors.

She dashed to the side and used the breeze made by said action to blow the spider monster back and knock it off its game. Running at its stunned form, she quickly shot a bolt of electricity at it and tackled it out the window and into the field outside.

Landing on the grass with a thud, Evelyn exhaled as she felt the area around her give her more power than what she had been receiving inside. With a burst of speed that had previously been impossible for her, she struck the monster in the face and watched as it was thrown forward a few feet.

Before she could go for a follow-up attack, the spider monster spat some type of webbing from its mouth, ensnaring her.

'Shit! If I don't break out of this soon, I'll be this things dinner!'

She breathed in, before exhaling a gust of wind from her mouth, throwing it away from her as she used the winds to shred the webbing surrounding her. She then turned her attention back to the spider, before raising her hands to the sky and using her magic to summon a lightning bolt from the sky to kill it.

BOOM!

The bolt struck true, and the monster collapsed face first, dead on impact.

Evelyn herself didn't have much more energy left, so when Hex landed next to her face first, she barely even registered what it said to her.

"So we have a problem. Apparently, Melody can increase the power of whoever she wants and well…"

Just as it finished talking, a warbled scream emanated from the mansion, and a fifty-foot tentacle monster broke through the house.

…

"The fuck are we supposed to do against that!?"

"Well first we should probably hit it or something."

Darius knew that sarcasm was the last thing Evelyn wanted to hear right now, but he couldn't help it.

"How much energy do you have left?"

Evelyn just panted slightly and stood up, before activating her gear again.

"Not much, even when using my gear, I can probably get one good attack in before tapping out."

That would have to do.

"Evelyn, I need you to make a tornado right on top of that thing."

The look of incredulity she gave him almost made him chuckle.

"I don't think that it'll work, I'll only be able to keep it up for at most a minute."

He did some math in his head. He only needed about forty-five seconds for his plan to work.

"Do it."

Evelyn closed her eyes and held her hands out towards the mass of tentacles, and the sky darkened.

Gale force winds began to pick up and it wasn't long before a tornado had formed on the tentacle creature, though it didn't seem to do much, though that was fine.

Flying up above the tornado, Darius put his hands together and pumped power through them in order to make a fireball the size of a car. He then lobbed the thing into the tornado and watched as the tornado lit up in flames.

The monster's screams were music to his ears, but he wasn't done. Feeling the rain begin to fall, Darius flew up until he was just below the clouds. And that's when the lightning bolt struck him.

As soon as contact happened, he did his best to hold the lightning into himself, before slapping the bottom of his palms together and spreading his fingers, electricity arcing between them. A second, then a third. The lightning kept striking him, burning his skin and frying his sense of pain. He just had to wait a little bit longer.

The flamenado began to dissipate, and with that Darius finally fired.

To call the energy that left his body a lightning bolt would do it a disservice. No, what struck the hentai monster was nothing short of pure apocalyptic wrath given form. The resulting sound from the explosion would rupture a normal person's eardrums, and the destruction that came after was nothing short of awe inspiring.

There was fire everywhere, and a giant crater where the beast had been and there were large chunks of tentacle everywhere.

Touching down, Darius suppressed a grunt as his nervous system finished healing and his sense of pain returned. Shambling over to the crater, large chunks of tentacle surrounded Melody's broken form. The beast had shielded her from most of the blast.

'A father till the end.'

She tried to keep wailing, but the blast had left her too weak, so the best she could do was whimper in pain. Darius knelt down beside her, placed his hands on her head, and quickly snapped her neck, watching as the life faded from her eyes.

He jerkily walked over to Evelyn and saw her barely hanging on to life.

"It would make more sense to let her die User."

It would, wouldn't it?

Kneeling beside her, he placed a hand on her head, and used his biomancy to heal her, watching as her body knit itself together. Was he was done, he sat down next to her and focused his remaining power on healing himself.

He'd eat the remains later.

…

Ah, that one was definitely a fun one. This is easily my most action-packed chapter, and the rest of the arc may end up being the same way if things go how I think they will.

The good-will this fic is getting is definitely a bit surprising, but its good to know that people are enjoying this little story of mine. This has been your not so local author-man, thanks for reading.