Far from where Liby was, in this dark night, a soul crept throughout the darkness, away from the populated areas of any known civilization. It was a sort of shadow of the night, walking, running and flying with no halting motion to keep it from its mysterious destination. The damned thing, Lupa of the Loud lineage, experienced her power-up, test-driving it like it were some fancy new car Elon Musk had created via a dream during sleep.

Lupa had bonded with the shadow demon that had been leeching off Loanne Wardell for long, and too long for it to have been healthy for the latter woman. The times were gonna change again, now that Lupa, in the demon's eyes, was more of a compatible host to it, for Lupa was of low morale and would possibly descend to an inhuman the way it itself was. And, if it was written somewhere in a codex of all human history, the two beings were written together for a time being. The final hours of Lupa Loud's young life with the demon, going down in history a hunter of the supernatural.

But then, it just might have been folly in the end.

Act VIII: Nine Years Later, Chapter VIII: A World Of Monsters

"Can't see how you got a C-list tier actress to do what you wanted," she joked. "Props on that and in not having her get caught."

Currently, the demon had taken form of a layer of armor akin to a medieval knight's own, worn in comfort by her, covering her from neck to feet only. It only emitted a lowly hiss in response, prompting Lupa to continue conversing with it.

"What, not gonna speak? You were pretty talkative back at Loanne's place, and now you're quiet here-"

"Beeeeing connected to youuuu, I can seeeeee all youuuu've seeeeeen and feeeeelt..." Again, it hissed, almost as if it was, somehow, disgusted. "I seeeeee... Everything..."

"H-hey, get out of my head," Lupa slapped her hand lightly upon her head. "I don't appreciate this invasion of my privacy. Don't tell me you intruded on Loanne's?"

This time, the armor didn't hiss or even rattle away its organic metal. This left Lupa giving up on small talk, focusing again on their current objective; finding the pair of girls made of her's and Lucy's essence. Not long after she'd be gone, the demon would stick to someone else not meant to do its evil bidding; someone with so little experience in the art of darkness or not at all, even. Not with Lupa, this would not stand with her. Having the demon attached to her meant someone having been spared, so she was grateful to have done that at least. This creature was meant to he helmed by the pair Lilith and Lumi, qualified hosts for it. The work, to be continued by them until they were over, ended. The tricky part was what came after, but Lupa felt she knew she had the right words to convince either of them to replace her after her death. And, with a piece of herself in them, she wouldn't have too much trouble appealing to them.

The problem was finding them, but if she knew anything-

"I smell bloooood... Inhuman blooooood..."

"Category?" Lupa lowered altitude in the air, coming close to the ground as she passed a cold lake beneath. "This environment tells me we're dealing with either a Tiramakkuri demon or Hellve."

"Noooo, the bloood is noooot faiiiint..."

Lupa landed on the ground, posing steady before the forest in front and all around her. "Saying it's bleeding? Is that right?"

"Yeeees!" The demon turned Lupa forcibly to the right, taking control of the right arm, pointing at the 2 o'clock position. "Thereee, I can heeeear rustling-"

"I need eyes, we're about to go dark with no moonlight covering us." Lupa regained control and advanced to the pinpointed coordinate, preparing for another supernatural fight. Damn it, I'm still quite rusty in this domain... But with this demon, I should have no problem taking down-

"I heeear something else moooving... Moving towaaards us!"

"Us?" Lupa didn't stop, and it was quite a shock that made even her heart to a wonderful backflip when a dark shadow came out flying from the woods. The moonlight shone upon the shadow, able to be both seen and recognized right away. "H-holy shit-"

The being that had hit the ground had looked a hundred percent like Lupa. The same hairstyle and color, the same dark clothes, same skin, and when the doppelganger had gotten up to recover, she had the same voice just as the demon-protected Lupa had. "But-" Lupa made no sense of it- and neither did the demon around her body. "Wait, what am I looking at? There's no way-"

The second Lupa recovered, standing with dirt on her clothes and skin, body stinging with the blows dealt to her by the current enemy in the woods. If only... I had my demon-

"H-hey, you-" Lupa called out to the doppelganger, taking a slow approach. She's neither of the two ghoul girls created from the ritual nine years ago... This is an exact copy of me, but how?

The second Lupa, not having sensed the other, raised her hands as she turned her whole body. "Hmm!"

"Don't-" Lupa took a defensive stance, arms going up in case she had to fight her doppelganger. "God, I have so many questions-"

"Bet you do..." The second Lupa lowered her guard and merely grinned arrogantly at her other. "This makes things easier, I've been looking for the pair but I had to find you just as well."

"Why do you need the pair for?" Lupa asked, secretly hoping, even as little the likelihood would be, that they had the same agenda. "And what about me? Why me?"

"You can help me find them-" Lupa Two then corrected herself, "I mean, you and your demon there. Pity I don't have mine, left him behind."

What is she talking about...? Lupa looked behind her doppelganger, seeing another shadowy figure move about behind some large shrubbery bushes. The other Lupa followed suit and took her defensive stance again. "Is that a Tiramakkuri beast?"

"Oh yeah, it's the moose one-"

If you've never seen it or had a faint of heart that would prevent you from even trying to visualize it, you probably didn't want to break that restraint just to see it; the monster tonight was a true beast clocking at eight feet and a half, revealing itself as a rather humanoid type of creature with a different variation of a moose head. From the neck below to the feet, it had a great physique that was not noticeable in its greatness, thanks to the light layer of dark brown fur and the many scars done by blades that were the main takeaway if you were to look at the body for the first few seconds. Secondly, its head was almost the same as a normal moose head, but its chin ended in a serrated point, barely touching the neck, and of course if it bobbed its head down, the moose Tiramakkuri would pierce itself there. Its eyes were beady, black pearls of no life whatsoever, mouth full of uneven, decayed jaggers for teeth that served only to ravage its prey in the most vicious ways that would make your stomach churn- and its prey these days were mostly campers or other wanderers at the deader hours. And with its massive antlers and the human body parts that hung on them like decorations, the two Lupas understood the danger staring back ominously at them.

The beast had no hint of humanity within it and was not bound by human customs and ideals to even consider stopping its insatiable bloodlust for humans. It was ready to kill again.

"I've been having trouble, but I'm glad you're here," Lupa Two told the main Lupa. "The both of us can take the beast down together! Separate your demon, I know you've signed your life away-"

How does-?! Lupa tapped on the chest plating. "Defensive maneuver, shield me!"

''Yeeees, ma'aaaaaam," the shadow demon croaked out wickedly. It reformed its cellular state, rendering itself into a liquid-like state and slipping itself out of Lupa- and the poor girl closed her mouth and held her breath for the utter shit that its essence tasted of- and solidified itself back, remaining in its sentient armor form.

The Tiramakkuri beast let out a deafening roar, using one of its beastly feet to scratch upon the dirt right before charging at the three. When it did, Lupa Two rose in the air and moved swiftly to meet it halfway, using her telekinesis to slow it down in its tracks. It worked enough for it to focus on its movement, prompting her to launch her own offense, raising her fists and conjoining them for a hard head strike- even though she knew it might not have been effective. It was that blood and the wiring from dear father that made her try. And try, she did, but her direct blows were weak here, dealing so little damage to the beast. She made a valiant attempt to back away by kicking herself off of its chest, but was snagged by her feet and yanked right onto the dirt.

"N-no way-" Lupa gulped, her ears taking in the bloodcurdling scream from the doppelganger. "Okay, onward!"

The armored demon raced towards the monstrous foe, albeit with slower movement. "Thiiiing is woundeeeed!"

Lupa Two forced herself to roll out of the way, saving herself from being stomped about. She focused on slowing the Tiramakkuri beast down again, this time tugging on its hands. "Hey, stop standing around, other me! Use the tree branches!"

"Tree-?" Lupa then understood it and took to the air, flying past the armored demon as it attacked the beast. She approached the treeline and started removing as many branches as she could, until she had a wave of branches of all sizes floating around as a wall, then flew back just as the Tiramakkuri beast swung its legs and kicked the armored demon away. "KEEP HOLDING IT!"

Lupa Two switched her grip and used her powers to bend the monster down on its knees, then its back down so it'd go and stay down. "THIS BETTER WORK!"

"DON'T YOU KNOW?!"

"Terrethiaaaaaans..." groaned the sentient armor. "Focus..."

"J-JUST KEEP IT DOWN!"

Lupa brought the wall of branches raining down towards the beast, impaling the Tiramakkuri beast throughout its body, from the back of its head and down its backside right to its legs and feet. Its movement begun to die down, but it had changed its movement, frantically scratching its paws upon the dirt; it had known its life was beginning to fade out. "We've done it...!"

"Good, that'll put an end to its bloody rampage..." Lupa Two eased up her grip and went down on a knee, catching her breath. "Bastard hurt me too damn hard... My back is gonna really ache later."

The armored demon moved to stand on top of the dying creature, ensuring it could not make any escape even as futile as it might've been. "Yesssss, I am very satisfieeeeed."

Lupa landed gently on her feet opposite the doppelganger. "Okay, start talking... Tell me who the hell you are and..." She eyed the copy up and down again. "Why's the pair important to you? Like, what do you want with all three of us?"

"You'll just have to wait and see, but I hope you can trust me..." Lupa Two reached a hand out for Lupa to take. "I don't have anything to hide from you, so whatever questions you have-"

"Demon..." Lupa directed her defender, "restrain my knockoff."

"Glad tooooooo..." The walking knight armor moved away from the now-dead creature and pinned Lupa Two with no issue, pressing hard against her hands and feet. "Can I kill?"

"Not until I get answers..." Lupa came up to her copy and bent a knee down. "You even have my special ability, that means-"

"A deal with them, yes!" Lupa Two verified. "We've done it, Lucy before us, and..." She then went silent, blinking repeatedly, showing Lupa that there was some kind of pain seemingly surfacing. "I need to say, we're one whole idiot."

"Why's that?" Lupa formed her hand to snap form and set it upon the latter's forehead. "This is the equivalent of a bullet to the head. I snap my finger and you-"

"Now you're gonna see..."

And see she most certainly did, after a sudden flash of white- was it of her own imagination or something else?- had filled her eyes, then followed by the big black canvas of pure nothingness, to which she felt alone and could not even act on her own. The black screen, a scary and mysterious thing that could have been death itself, and death too soon if anything. No, it shouldn't have been now. And not after she made contact with-

She made contact with the copy, and then this happened. Was it the doppelganger who really did this, whatever this was?

"...What I've seen!" Lupa Two's voice echoed throughout in a booming voice, almost as if a layer of God-sized speakers floated high in the air.

Lupa blinked once, and found herself in the back of a pick-up truck, firing from the gun she made from her fingers at some phenos who chased her and the driver. She only watched but was not in control. "I don't remember this..." she formed mentally. "What- Wait, this... This is Royal Woods!"

She blinked again. The setting changed completely, showing her through the eyes of yet another different Lupa, dying at the hands of a supernaturally-possessed ventriloquist dummy. "N-no! Not-"

And blinked again rapidly to take herself away from this horror. But it was the next setting that made her truly feel nauseated. In this one, there was a Lupa right underneath a tree, lonesome with nothing else but a single shard of glass that this Lupa ran across her arms to slit herself in a disturbingly depressing effort to commit suicide. "WHY ARE YOU SHOWING ME THIS?!"

Again, the booming voice of the doppelganger spoke, "You can avoid all of this, Lupa. These are the futures you're gonna live, unless you can help stop her."

"STOP HER?! HER WHO?" She chose to blink again, and was given the answer to the biggest question thus far; this was the end, but she didn't know it. The final moment before everything became the forgotten, and the new spawned from this dead past. The rising Lola Loud, the one who attained godhood in that moment, rose from the ground and amazed and baffled everyone present, including whom Lupa believed was another version of her. "Why is Lola...?"

"You are a vital piece of the puzzle, you need to survive long enough..."

"L-long enough for what?" Lupa kept watching through Grimm Girl's eyes, growing scared of Lola by the second. "What is she-? What did she-?"

"You're going to come to find out... We need you to perform the ritual that will fuse Lilith and Lumi together-"

Lupa then, as herself in astral projection, saw Grimm Girl flying towards Lissandra Mercer and Bethany Chang, getting a real close look at Grimm Girl in the process. "Wait.. She... She is actually-"

"They are to become one, and with the help of the shadow demon, they are three times the manpower as you are by yourself," Lupa Two explained.

"Then..." Lupa kept shuddering through her words. "I've succeeded, h-haven't I? I'm long gone and she- I mean, they t-took-"

"It is as you see it."

Lupa watched Grimm Girl use telekinesis to take control of a mobile turret of a truck and let loose upon Lissandra in her lizard form. Bethany took cover behind a pillar, avoiding the strays from the turret while Lissandra took full force. While the bullets didn't penetrate the skin, they surely hurt, compelling the new Superbeast to move out of the way.

The two additional figures on the far left, Lyra and Lynnette, were barely able to retreat. Lupa didn't see who, but one of them yelled out to the fused pair, "KEEP THOSE PRIMERS BUSY!"

"Get out of here, girls!" Grimm Girl beckoned to the teenage Laudes, landing right in front of the pillar Bethany had hidden behind, circling it and meeting the katana-wielding Primer. "Boo!"

Bethany swung her blade once, but froze in place, allowing herself to be slapped and thrown back with no effort. "Ack!"

"How's it feel to be at a disadvantage?"

"L-Lizy!" Bethany helplessly yelped.

Lupa had followed Grimm Girl close behind, only watching without trying to make sense of things. The reptilian girl made a frantic pounce from behind, attempting to attack Grimm Girl- only for the dark layers of her clothes to spring forth like a liquid substance and strike upon Lissandra, taking over her and reforming itself into a familiar layer of armor. "Wait, that's the demon!"

And then, the true form of Grimm Girl was finally visible to Lupa; she was an albino in complete white clothes, only made dark when the demon latched itself onto her clothes and hair. "This is c-crazy... The two, and the demon... This is the future!"

"The very future that must be set into motion. It is with the help of Grimm Girl-"

"G-Grimm Girl?"

"I will transfer my special power to you, which will allow you to talk to the alternate versions of yourself of all time, in every plane of existence, or that we would call the multiverse."

"Wh-why me? I- I mean, we're just hunters of all things supernatural... You're showing me stuff that I still don't fucking believe-"

"You will soon enough... And you will be far beyond this world of monsters. Far beyond. Find them, find the pair, I don't have long being here, but for the time being..."

Lupa returned to her body from the strange realm she inhabited, taking her hand off the other Lupa's forehead. "I'm going to help you out until our time comes up, until we ensure everyone is safe. We can bring back the fallen, and we can even ensure a brighter future for the daughter you've left behind back in Grimmtown."