Disclaimer: I don't own Overlord or Dungeons & Dragons

The Greater Apotheosis of Ainz Ooal Gown

Book : Dusk War

Chapter 4: Final Battle

Beta:


At Ainz's call, the many powers of Realmspace had come to Nazarick to discuss the invasion of the Voidharrow. To his surprise, everyone had turned up. Forces of all alignments, of all planes, creatures of all kinds had deigned to answer his call. From gods to primordials to demon lords to elder evils. All were represented. Such was the threat posed by the Voidharrow that all had gathered to discuss a unified response to the invasion. Tensions were thus expectedly high in the Nazarick Throne Room, only held in check by the looming danger they were all under and the presence of Ainz Ooal Gown, the one who had scored the greatest victories against the enemy, acting as mediator kept it from boiling over.

That did not however keep the disparate factions from verbally sniping at each other and filling the vast hall with noise. Thus as Ainz rose to address his gathered peers, he was forced to slam the butt of the Staff of Ainz Ooal Gown into the ground loudly to garner their attention.

"After long hours of discussions," Ainz said once the noise had died down to more manageable levels. "I am pleased to inform all of you, my esteemed peers, that we have finally concocted a plan that we hope will help us win this war against the Voidharrow."

This was met with excited murmuring from the gathered dignitaries but Ainz lifted a hand for patience and waited for the commotion to die down once more before continuing.

"However, before I share it. All of us will need to properly understand the context of the situation we find ourselves in. To that end, I will have my subordinate explain."

Saying this, he gestured to Demiurge who promptly stepped forward and addressed the gathered divinities.

"Honored guests," The tuxedo wearing Devil began. "As most of you are probably aware, the Voidharrow's invasion of the Astral Sea and the Prime Material Plane of Realmspace have been halted, however our own counterattack into the Elemental Chaos has ground to a halt and has even been pushed back. This despite our armies being bolstered by forces from across the Realms."

This was met with uneasy murmurs from the crowd as expected. The efforts that the Realms' powers had gathered to resist the Voidharrow was unprecedented. Forces that had been at war with each other since the Dawn War were now fighting on the same side, yet even then the Voidharrow was holding out. This fact alone was enough to strike fear into the hearts of many of those gathered.

Probably in a bid to let them vent a bit of this natural fear, Demiurge allowed the murmuring to continue for a moment before he raised his hand to signal for silence so he could continue.

Hmm. His ability to play the crowd is impressive. Ainz thought to himself idly as the Throne Room quieted. I can learn a thing or two from him.

"However, not everything is bad news." Demiurge said as he began speaking again. "From our studying of the combat data we gained from our counterattacks, we have gained vital knowledge. We now know that the power of all of the Voidharrow's beings at any given time is linked to the level at which their vile corruption has affected the area. A limitation that we have proof extends to Tharizdun himself. It is with this knowledge that we have formulated a plan to cut the head off the snake of the Voidharrow menace."

Again Demiurge paused, this time, Ainz saw, to allow the hope his words had kindled to catch alight.

He is truly a master of crowd manipulation. The Overlord noted. He was sure many of the divinites knew they were being played, but Demiurge was doing it so masterfully that they either didn't care or were amused enough to play along. At the very least, no one objected. For which Ainz was glad.

"Now," the well dressed Devil said when he judged the crowd was enthused enough. "Let me outline our plan."


Days after the summit in Nazarick, in accordance to the plan Demiurge had drawn up thousands of portals opened near to each other inside the Voidharrow occupied region of the Elemental Chaos and from them stepped forth hundreds of allied divinities who proceeded to blast away the infestation surrounding the gateways. The gods of Nazarick were no exception and even as Cocytus stepped through he used his Acala's Sword to disintegrate the hundreds of Voidharrow abominations clustered around the portal.

A few of those must have been anchors. The Vermin Lord noted as he saw whole swathes of the enemy now rushing forwards to fill the gap he had created die with no apparent cause. If so, they are-

"Weak," He commented with irritation as used Frost Breath in combination with Piercing Icicle to freeze and skewer the entire enemy front line. "They are. So. Weak. Compared to. Ogdoad!"

"Mass Purifying Lance!" Shalltear incanted from where she hovered to this right as she activated her newly created skill and sent dozens of lances of holy energy into the enemy ranks and felled dozens of the larger monsters. Some of whom were anchors and took hundreds more of their lesser brethren with them into oblivion as they faded out of existence.

"Maybe they switched to a quantity over quality approach?" His fellow Floor Guardian suggested as they both unleashed another set of skills to hold the Voidharrow swarm back from the portal behind them.

An effort helped by Deathwing who flew through it just then and proceeded to circle around it, strafing the enemy monsters with bolts of golden lightning that was his Gravity Beam breath weapon derived from his domain as the god of the vacuum as he did, tearing them apart by the hundreds with the shearing gravitic forces of his new skill before banking over to join them.

"It doesn't seem to be working out for them." He commented with a pleased growl as he hovered above Cocytus and Shalltear whilst joining them in blasting away at the enemy with his skills.

Unleashing another Acala's Sword Cocytus just nodded distractedly, even as he watched the impressive sight of Celestials, Devils, Demons and everything in between fighting alongside each other against a common foe as mortal elements of the allied forces began pouring out of the portals and into the footholds the divinities had created where they quickly formed up into units before throwing themselves at the enemy with gusto. As far as the intermediate god could see, divinities fought alongside their followers, scything through the Voidharrow ranks like a hot knife through butter and focusing their power on the anchors of this abominable horde as far as possible. Even as others stood guard over the portals and protected them and the troops coming through them from the enemy.

The three gods of Nazarick had been part of the latter but as their troops secured the portal on their own, Cocytus turned to his peers.

"Time. To. Go. On. The Offensive." The god of honor and warriors told them with a weapon in each hand and his heart singing the song of battle.

"Wait." Shalltear said unexpected, pointing off into the distance. "Looks like I spoke too soon earlier."

Looking towards the direction she was indicating, Cocytus saw a number of particularly large Voidharrow monsters begin pushing their way out of the unending hordes of the enemy towards the frontlines.

"Look sharp." Deathwing said. "One of them is coming this way."

The monster crawling its way towards them had a head similar to that of a crocodile and a maw with knife-like teeth, even on the interior lining. In addition, six large tusks, three on each side, protruded from the fulcrum-region of its mouth. A large number of vines and tendrils grew from all over its body, some ending in sharp, spear-like ends, while others sported small, sharp-toothed mouths. It had four stubby, root-like legs that it used to drag itself along the ground as well as what appeared to be meaty yellow and red-orange flesh resembling a brain-like surface underneath the tangled mess of vines and plant tissue that made up most of its bulk.

As befitting the first to identify the threat, Shalltear went on the offensive first and gathering her magic she unleashed a spell.

"Maximize Magic: Greater Lethal!" The True Vampire cast, hitting the plant monster with a terrible burst of negative energy that had it reeling in pain.

Pressing the attack, Deathwing circled the twisted creature and bathed it in his Gravity Beam, cutting whole chunks off its mass. The floral monstrosity however was not so easily bested and lashed out with its tendrils sending a veritable jungle's worth of its vines out at them. Some lashed out at them like whips, others sought to coil around them, whilst yet others tried to impale them, and a handful even began spitting globs of acid at them. But each of the three gods of Nazarick were easily able to evade or cut through these assaults and press the attack.

Chief among them was Cocytus who under the supporting suppressive fire from Shalltear and Deathwing, closed to close quarters with the monster.

"Vidyārāja Strike!" The Vermin Lord chanted as he unleashed a cutting wave of golden energy from God Slaying Emperor Blade as the odachi cut deeply into the enemy's bulk.

A blow he immediately followed up by slashing into the gaping wound he'd created with his halberd, Decapitation Fang. This expanded it further and he finished his attack by jabbing the twin lightning infused lances that he wielded in his lower arms, sending innumerable bolts of electricity surging through the monster's twisted flesh. Thus he was treated to the sight of the monster spasming from being electrocuted as he leapt away from the enemy's questing tendrils.

Much to his dismay however the damned thing had recovered enough by the time he'd landed, coincidentally after having cut a dozen of its vines that tried to catch him while he was midair. Worse, it seemed it was readying some kind of powerful attack as a glow was traveling up from the fleshy portion towards its oversized mouth which was gaping open.

"Don't let it pull it off!" Shalltear shouted as she sent a Purifying Lance directly down the beast's gullet.

The attack shot out the other side of the monster's head but while it stumbled back at the blow, it did not deter it from continuing to power up its attack and so Cocytus sprinted forward to add his firepower to the attempt to stop it. Unfortunately, he knew he wouldn't make it. Not with the monster throwing its vines in his way in a deliberate attempt to waylay him. Luckily though, Deathwing was able to pick up the slack and even whilst jinking and dodging through the air to avoid a pack of flying lesser Voidharrow that had appeared to harass him, he managed to line up a shot of his Gravity Beam. The breath weapon hit the plant monster in the large target it presented in the form of its gaping mouth and like Shalltear's Purifying Lance blasted clean through its head but where that had yielded only a relatively small wound, the greater size of Deathwing's attack completely blasted the thing's head off. The energy it had gathered thus shot out of the stump of its neck like a geyser and fired harmlessly up into the air.

Amazingly, the beast was still not dead.

A state of affairs that Cocytus was happy to rectify as he unleashed an Acala's Sword at the monster's bulk, ripping deep gashes into its body and cutting whole chunks clean off.

"Bladestorm!" He incanted as he activated the skill that turned him into a spinning twister of deadly blades that shredded the plant monster's remains.

"It. Is. Done." Cocytus declared as he leapt out of the disintegrating remains of the beast once his skill deactivated.

"Yeah," Shalltear acknowledged as she pulled her Spuit Lance out of the disintegrating corpse of a Voidharrow flyer. "And we're doing well overall too."

"Indeed," Deathwing said in agreement as he spat a shower of fireballs to scorch a pack of distant Voidharrow that had been firing spheres of destructive energies at allied forces like some kind of improvised artillery.

A quick survey told Cocytus they were right. They were indeed laying waste to Tharizdun's forces and forcing them back across what seemed to be the entire front.

Of course, that's exactly when the Mad God decided to make his move.

Some distance away, the First of the Seldarine was leading his pantheon and their chosen elven followers in carving deep into the Voidharrow's ranks. Corellon Larethian himself was shooting down Voidharrow anchor monsters with his bow so quickly that his hand movements were so fast that it was a blur, even to Coctyus' eyes as a warrior god, when suddenly the humanoid black hole that was Tharizdun appeared from nowhere and shot a massive beam of energy at the Ruler of All Elves.

Finally. Cocytus thought with a pleased click of his mandibles even as the elf god barely evaded the attack with an acrobatic leap to the side. Now it is Demiurge's time for you to shine.


"There he is," the aforementioned Devil said with a pleased grin as he watched Tharizdun finally make his appearance on the magical display he was using to watch the battle.

Turning from said image, he addressed the gathered gods of magic, mystery and those with even a modicum of influence over the mystic arts that stood in Mystra, the goddess of Magic's palace in the Clockwork Nirvana of Mechanus.

"Ready?" Demiurge asked.

Mystra exchanged a look with the other gods who all nodded.

"Yes," Mystra informed him. "Let us end this war."

"Then let us begin." Demiurge said with a nod before he turned back to the view of the battlefield offered by the magical image even as vast mystic energies were channeled behind him.

It barely registered to him, so engrossed was he at seeing the foolish Tharizdun fall for the trap Lord Ainz had conceived. The Mad God even looked surprised as a pillar of light surrounded him out of nowhere as the spell being worked by the united powers of the gods of magic captured him. He struggled, throwing multiple iterations of what that the Devil recognized as the deadly Sphere of Annihilation at the barrier which coincided with grunts of pain from the magical gods.

"Hang on!" Mystra urged her compatriots. "We almost have him! Just hang on a little longer."

"Yes, just push a little harder." Demiurge said, adding a little encouragement of his own. "Just a little more."

Cries of effort sounded from the magical gods in reply as they presumably redoubled their efforts.

Their effort paid off however and the light that surrounded Tharizdun turned blinding before in one last burst of light he vanished from the Elemental Chaos.

Quickly, Demiurge waved his hand at the magical projection causing the current image it was showing to dissolve and reform into a new one that showed a desolate island in the middle of the Trackless Sea of Toril where on one end of the small isle stood his Master Lord Ainz in all his glory as he waited patiently and on the other, appearing in a pillar of light, emerged the Mad God Tharizdun.

"And so the final die is cast," Mystra said from behind him, sounding out of breath. "Let us hope your Master lives up to all that is said about him."

"Oh, I assure you that he will." Demiurge said with a confident smirk. "Just wait and see."


As the pillar of light deposited Tharizdun a few hundred meters ahead of him, the being who was once Suzuki Satoru and who was now known as the primordial Ainz Ooal Gown felt none of his subordinate's confidence. Thanks to his undead constitution though he didn't feel any of the crippling fear that being in the situation he found himself in would have elicited had he still been human. Instead, all he felt was an unnatural calm for which he was grateful for.

It was this calm that allowed him to not hesitate as he used his special ability and imposed his authority over all the space around him to lock down much of Tharizdun's power the moment that the Mad God arrived. Sadly, this move had the rather annoying side effect of doing the same for much of his own strength. Nevertheless, if he had hoped to win this fight it was a necessary sacrifice to make.

"What is this? What have you done!?" The humanoid black hole that was the Mad God howled as he sensed the restrictions he suddenly found himself under.

"Merely banned reality warping." Ainz told Tharizdun. "We'll be limited to our own magic and skills for the duration of this battle. Though I did also limit any further teleportation magic. I wouldn't want you to escape now would I?"

"Escape? You think you've caught me? How presumptuous, you insect." Tharizdun said with a scoff even as he shot a beam of entropic energy at Ainz who silently cast a Magic Shield and batted it away with the left hand he had covered in its neon green protective aura.

"Standardized spells?" Tharizdun mocked with a scowl. "You may be an insect but you are still a god. A being who can reshape reality with your will alone! And yet instead of embracing that power, you're lowering yourself to using standardized spells?"

"For the challenge, yes I do."

"Challenge!? You see me as a mere challenge!?" Tharizdun shouted, infuriated. "Die, you worm! Storm of Vengeance!"

"Spellbreaker." Ainz said calmly, dispelling the storm clouds that the Mad God's spell had gathered. "Did you think I would all you to set up a DOT (Damage Over Time) spell?"

The humanoid black hole's reply came in the way of another spell.

"Meteor Swarm!"

For someone adverse to the use of standardized spells, he's quite adept at them. Ainz thought idly as he used a Shell Barrier to shield him from the falling meteors Tharizdun had summoned and readied his counterattack.

"Triplet, Maximize Magic: Reality Slash!" The Overlord said almost lazily as with a casual wave of his left hand, he sent three blades of warped space at Tharizdun.

"Is that the best you can do?" The Mad God shouted, making no effort to evade or shield against the incoming spell. "Such weak magic won't even be able to ha- Argh!"

His haughty little speech was cut off as the three Reality Slashes hit him dead on and proceeded to cut deep wounds into his body.

"Dodging or blocking an incoming unfamiliar attack is just the smart thing to do." Ainz said with a shake of his head, before continuing his attack. "Maximize Magic: Vermilion Nova!"

This consumed the Mad God in a pillar of fire that just had the humanoid black hole screaming in even more pain.

"I will not be defeated so easily!" Tharizdun roared as he unleashed a burst of dark energy.

When the lightshow faded, it revealed that Tharizdun had morphed into a monster with a ursine body with a frothing mouth shaped like a hand. Standing on his hind legs, he revealed that his new form had a chest full of eyes even as the Mad God let out a blood curdling roar before charging at Ainz intent on engaging him in melee.

"Fly," Ainz said almost absently as he floated lazily out of the reach of Tharizdun's monstrous new form. "You do realize I'm pretty much a dedicated caster? Staying away from melee attackers is practically the first thing I learned how to do."

Tharizdun's only reply to Ainz's taunt was to let out a frustrated roar.

Guess he can't talk in this form. Ainz noted with a frown. Shame. Exchanging taunts with him earlier was actually entertaining.

Despite seemingly having made a misstep, Tharizdun did not change shape. Instead he cupped the hand like mouth together and began gathering power.

"You think I'd let you pull that off?" Ainz said with a raised eyebrow. "Maximize Magic: Gravity Maelstrom!"

At his invocation, a powerful gravity distortion was conjured directly where Tharizdun was standing that promptly caught his monstrous form in its grip. The powerful shearing gravitic forces of the distortion pushed and pulled the Mad God's body in multiple directions all at once, tearing it apart in the process and tossing the mangled remains out like so much refuse.

In midair however Tharizdun was once more surrounded by dark energy as he transformed again. In this new shape, he'd regained his humanoid upper body but in place of his lower body was a nimbus of darkness, with six massive blue-tipped wings protruding from where his legs should be. Two linked halos, one larger than the other floated behind him, with the larger one shaped to look like a sun. His right arm was replaced by a dark red wing and his eyes were ablaze with a dark energy.

"If you're going to reduce this fight to a competition at shapeshifting, as boring as that will be I'll oblige." Ainz said with a roll of his eyes as he tapped into the portion of his divine power he had not locked away for this fight and in a burst of dark energy transformed into a gigantic skeletal dragon.

Immediately upon assuming his new shape, Ainz opened his maw wide and unleashed a cone of negative energy that washed over Tharizdun.

"Fool!" The Mad God shouted unscathed by the attack. "Did you think that negative energy would harm me? Among other things, I am a god of death."

Damn! I forgot that. Ainz thought, cursing his oversight as he snapped his jaws shut and began evasive maneuvers as Tharizdun counterattacked by tossing dozens of iterations of Sphere of Annihilation at him.

The primordial managed to evade most of them but all it took was one hit to his chest to send him falling from the sky thanks to the destructive power Tharizdun had put into its creation.

I really need to practice using this form more often if I want to use it in a fight again. Ainz thought to himself as he pushed himself back to his feet and breathed a stream of fire at Tharizdun in retaliation.

Said god just deflected it with a Magic Shield enshrouded hand in what Ainz was sure was a mocking imitation of his own opening move of this fight. Not that the primordial cared one whit about being taunted or the failure of his attack, having used it merely as a cover as he leapt back into the air.

Surprisingly though Tharizdun let him, choosing not to press his advantage.

"Why are you dragging this out?" The Mad God chose to ask instead, his brows furrowed in angry confusion. "Take your true divine form already!"

I honestly was trying to avoid that. Ainz thought with a grimace that thankfully did not translate to his current Dragonic form. I have even less practice with that than this one.

Nevertheless, it seemed Ainz had little choice. While he wasn't completely sure, he had a feeling the Mad God's current many winged form was exactly that and if he wanted to win then he had to take his true divine form. Nothing else had the power to match the other divinity's true form.

"If you insist." Ainz cried out in annoyance and obliged, calling on his power and surrounding himself in his power to transform into his truest form.

As the obligatory burst of light and energy faded, Ainz had resumed his humanoid form but now stood at a height on par with a Giant. Beyond his height there were also a handful of other differences, such as left hand which had transformed into a Dragon skull, the dozen pair of wings made of dark energy that now grew from his back and aura of dark energy with the occasional howling souls of the damned screaming around him that now permanently enshrouded his body.

"That's fairly impressive, I suppose." Tharizdun said looking over Ainz's form appraisingly.

Using the Mad God's lack of wariness, Ainz silently activated The Goal of All Life is Death.

Now to distract him for twelve seconds. Ainz thought as the clock face that characterized the skill's activation appeared behind his back but was instantly hidden by his churning aura.

"Howls of the Damned." Ainz said, activating the basic offensive skill of his current form and sending hundreds of spirits of the damned shooting out of his aura like bullets at Tharizdun.

"Child's play." Tharizdun said with a scoff as he simply created a Sphere of Annihilation in front of him that tanked the attack for him.

It would be, if it that the end of my attack. Ainz thought as he raised the Staff of Ainz Ooal Gown at Tharizdun whose view was blocked by the Sphere of Annihilation he was using as a defense.

"Lance of Torment." The primordial cast one of the hundreds of new spells he'd created since his apotheosis and sent a psychic lance at the Mad God which being psionic in nature completely bypassed the influence of the Sphere of Annihilation to hit its target.

"A psionic attack?" Tharizdun said with a laugh. "You think a petty psionic attack can even shake me? The Mad God? How foolish!"

The only fool here is you. Ainz thought as the twelve seconds he needed to activate The Goal of All Life is Death ran its course and the skill's ability to strengthen the instant death effect of magic and skills to the point of bypassing any immunity or resistance came into effect.

"True Death!" Ainz cast with full confidence.

A confidence which was justified as the Sphere of Annihilation Tharizdun conjured sputtering out of existence as the Mad God promptly fell out of the sky dead.

"And that's-"

"Not so fast!" Tharizdun shouted unexpected as he slowly floated back into the air. "I never expected your instant death magic to work on me. But considering how you killed Atropus I should have. That said, it was a wasted effort. I am one with the Voidharrow, did you think that even if it did that it would last?"

Gotcha.

"No," Ainz said with a chuckle as he tweaked the restrictions he'd placed on reality in the local area. "But thank you for explaining to me your connection to the Voidharrow."

"What do you-" Tharizdun began only to suddenly spasm in pain. "What have you done!?"

"My greatest power is not my magic." Ainz explained with a smirk, "It is my ability to passively impose my perception of the world on all those around me in spite of the powers of others. I cannot block things which I do not understand however and your little trick with the Voidharrow was exploiting that little loophole."

"So what? You've cut me off?" Tharizdun laughed. "Even if you kill me here, the Voidharrow will just resurrect me elsewh-"

"I know." Ainz said, his smirk just growing. "So I manipulated your link. Turned you into not just the central anchor for that abominable infection but its very embodiment, its only true anchor. Do you know what that means?"

Tharizdun's eyes widened in horror and he backed away from the Overlord.

"I see that you do." Ainz said, amused by the Mad God's reaction. "If you die here, the Voidharrow dies with you."

"Then I'll just need to kill you instead!" Tharizdun roared, beating his many wings at Ainz and sending a barrage of energy bullets raining down at him.

Ainz just wrapped his own wings around himself in a protective cocoon and raised his Dragonic skull even as he began gathering the energy for what he had planned.

He honestly wanted to use The Goal of All Life is Death again but knew he couldnot. The spell had a cooldown time between uses of a 100 hours and while he could easily lift that restriction with a little reality warping through his godly powers, doing so would unlock the very restrictions on such that was giving him the advantages that he was using to keep up with Tharizdun.

No matter. I will just have to defeat him the old fashioned way.

Leveling the skull shaped left hand at Tharizdun, who was desperately firing every attack he could conceive at him, Ainz opened the skeletal Dragon maw which was now brimming with his gathered power.

"Wrath of Ainz Ooal Gown!" Ainz incanted, firing a pitch black fireball in the shape of his own head out of the skeletal Dragon maw, screeching across the distance and slamming into the Mad God where it consumed him in a pillar of dark flames.

"No~!" Tharizdun screamed in agony as he was obliterated by the attack.

As the Mad God died, Ainz felt a surge of immense power fill up his being.

For a moment he panicked, afraid that he had inadvertently absorbed the Voidharrow. However, as he felt none of the corrupting, tainted touch of that vile thing he relaxed.

I do wonder what I gained though. Ainz pondered even as he transformed back into his normal form. It can't just be Tharizdun's divine essence. There was too much power for that.

Well whatever, I can figure it out later. He concluded with a shrug as he opened a Gate portal back to Nazarick. For now let's go savor my victory.


Done!

Not too happy with this chapter to be honest. Or this last 'book' to be honest. But I'm not sure how to fix it. Shrug. I'm just going to move on. I've got another project lined up already and I'd rather start writing it that get bogged down here trying to fix things. A project that at the point of this chapter's posting is likewise being released so for any Game of Thrones/A song of Ice and Fire fans out there feel free to check out Alyssa I Targaryen.

That said, there's still an epilogue to this story before I call it quits on it entirely so see you guys there.

Before I go though, here's a Visual Guide for some of the things I borrowed from various IPs:

The monster that Cocytus, Shalltear and Deathwing fought = Biollante from the Godzilla franchise

Tharizdun's ursine form = Monstrosity of Sin from Dark Souls 3

Tharizdun's winged form = Safer∙Sephiroth from Final Fantasy VII

That's it for the chapter folks. So till next time ban kwana!