BU-BOOM
With one last Super Shotgun blast at point-blank range, the Dark Lord of Jakkal fell to the ground. His hulking red armour sparked and fizzed with the damage felt to him by his relentless opponent, and could barely move as he reached for his sword. It proved to be a futile effort, as the blade slipped out of his weakened grasp.
The Dark Lord had no choice but to accept his fate. He had lost. His vengeance had been thwarted, and he would soon be reduced to non-existence but the one whom he hoped would be the weapon that would punish his betrayers. Using what strength he had left, he turned to face his executioner.
A being of pure might and malice, his presence towering over him with the unrelenting rage which radiated off of him in waves. His powerful physic was cast in a suit of impenetrable green armour, en being his forearms, bulging with muscle, as if too powerful to be withheld by any armour. Boots which pounded the earth with each step, and a helmet that the wearer had now cast aside, no doubt wanting to see the Dark Lord's last moments as clearly as possible.
He was the Hell Walker.
The Unchained Predator.
The eternal arch-enemy of all demonkind.
The Doom Slayer.
With what fleeting strength he had left, the Dark Lord lifted himself from the earth, choosing to meet his end head-on, rather than in a pitiful display of meekness and defeat.
"Tell me…have you anything to say to your creator…before you strike him down?"
The Doom Slayer stood before the kneeling demon lord, his face contorted in his permanent expression of pure fury.
The memories of the Knight Sentinels, his fallen brethren, and his second family, passed through his mind.
He raised his left arm, unsheathing the Doomblade attached to his wrist with a clench of his fist as he stared the Dark Lord down…
And then thrust it deep into his chest.
"No."
The Doom Slayer tore the blade back out of the Dark Lord, who after suffering the disastrous fatal wound, unleashed a burning red light into the sky, signalling all that he had finally been slain.
The demons outside of their home realm began to die out, burning away and leaving the humans free of their threat forever.
The Dark Lord's carcass began to glow, until his form, along with his demonic spirit, burst into bright light, causing the Doom Slayer to shield his eyes. When the light subsided, the Dark Lord was gone, leaving nothing behind but his dismantled armour.
The Dark Lord was dead.
The Sentinel Universe was finally free.
The Doom Slayer looked down at where the Dark Lord once lay, a rare feeling of accomplishment making its way into his hardened heart.
Suddenly, the Slayer felt his strength leaving him. His legs gave out in his weakness, causing him to fall to the ground.
As he struggled to move, the voice of VEGA, now known as the Father, resonated in his mind's ear.
"By his hand, all things were made…even you."
The Slayer understood. The power he was granted by the Sentinel, who turned out to be the narcissistic automaton, Samuel Hayden all along, originated from the Dark Lord himself, in an attempt to use the Slayer for his revenge. And now with him gone, his power went with him, being bled out of the Slayer, and leaving him weakened enough to lose consciousness.
For a sparing moment, the Slayer's vision returned. He found himself within the confines of the same stone casket the legions of Hell locked him away in after having a mountainous temple dropped on top of him. Three Makyrs, who had yet to fall to their disgusting transformations, lifted the sealing slab over his prone form, casting him in darkness, the only light he had being the radiating red symbol of the beast above him.
The symbol that was now his, and his alone.
The makers then turned and drifted away, most likely to return to their realm to face their eternity of misshapen punishment. As the Ancient gods watched over the stone casket, the words of the Corrax Entry resonated with them all.
…May your thirst for retribution never quench, may the blood on your sword never dry, and may we never need you again.
Much time has passed since the final battle for the second universe the Slayer called home. The Earth has come back from the brink of total destruction. The Sentinels have redeemed themselves for their misguided actions. Urdak and the Makyrs have been left to rot, and Jakkal and its demons have either been sealed away, or reduced to ash in the wind.
The Slayer has now been revered as an almighty saviour to all of the second universe, heralded as the hero who fought the demonic horde and banished them back to whence they came. And after his near-endless fight against all of Hell and its minions, he has been laid to rest, leaving him with something that he hadn't heard in over two eternities surrounded by screeching demons and deafening gunfire…
Silence.
However, as was his destiny, the Slayer's rest would not last forever.
Through his journey to activate the Gate of Divum so he can reach the Dark Lord's realm, he took the crystal which powered the World Spear in Argent D'Nur. In doing so, the hundreds of Elemental Wraiths sleeping inside the giant diamond-like vessel awoke, who soon learned the fate of the lost three of their brethren, and how the Slayer avenged their horrific fates.
The Wraiths, inter-dimensional beings of great power, knew all too well of the vast evil known as Hell, as they were forced to flee their home realm when the hordes of darkness invaded, casting everything they loved into blood and fire. When they learned of the Slayer's bottomless hatred for the demons, they decided in immediate unity that, while his fight in this realm was done, he was needed elsewhere.
Three of the all-powerful creatures travelled to the Slayer's resting place, where the Ancient gods continued to watch over him since his final battle. When they were met by the Wraiths, they were in great awe, as well as great fear, of the power they wielded, and made no move to obstruct them from their actions.
The three wraiths surrounded the casket and with the combined strength of their powers, encircled the stone container in glowing blue, elemental energy.
"Where you have closed two doors, leading to this world, as well as your own, there are many more that remain open." The first Elemental Wraith spoke from her mind's voice, having no need for her mouth.
"As the hordes of darkness push to get out, there are those who pry to get in." The second Wraith continued.
"We know you will not allow this." The third concluded. "You, who now alone bear the Mark of the Beast."
With one last mighty push, the energy shot into the sky, stretching far across the vast reaches of space, time, and reality…
With the Slayer and his casket in tow.
The Elemental Wraiths watched on as the Slayer soared through the cosmos, finishing their task of sending the Slayer to his next battle with one last declaration, spoken by all three in unison.
"Rip and Tear…Until it is Done."
Mt. Fuji.
Once a proud, standing symbol of Japan's beautiful landscape, was now reduced to a wounded mound of rock, with half of its enormous summit cast in a metal structure, where she was mined and broken down for the rich valuable fuel within her.
On one of the numerous levels of the Saturate mining facility, a middle-aged Japanese man, or an 'Eleven' as he and the rest of his people were now labelled, swung a pickaxe into the structure of Mt. Fuji. Doing so would have broken his heart, if there was anything there left to break. But, he had no choice, if it meant that he could make a living for the sake of his wife and children.
If you could call living under the Britannia's boot heel living…
As the man lifted his tool and swung it once more into the mountain's surface, he was suddenly thrown back by his own force when he struck something hard in the earth.
The man nursed himself from his rough landing, only to look to his pickaxe and see that the end had been completely bent.
"W-What the…?" He voiced to himself, before turning and whistling to a few of his co-workers. "Hey, guys! Could you give me a hand?"
Four other miners showed up to the man's aid, all as tired and covered in dirt as him. "What's up?"
"I think I found a pocket of Sakurite!" The man explained, holding up his ruined pickaxe. "There's no way I'm gonna be able to dig it out on my own. Think you could give me a hand?"
"Sure." The four miners gave the man a hand, hoisting up their pickaxes and swinging them into the spot where the man had failed.
A few minutes later, they began to break through. However, instead of the familiar bright pink hue that was the telltale sign of Sakurite, there was instead a glow of bright red, which made the workers feel uneasy. Deciding that their pay check was worth the risk, they all brushed away the broken gravel and found the last thing they ever expected to find.
An enormous stone casket, with a glowing red circle pattern engraved on the front…