Review Responses:
Yuuko Aosagibi- I'm not sure about that. Me and my beta kept having a pop-up on the pages for settings and docs and stuff asking us to acknowledge that emails were down right now, and we'd do that only for it to pop back up over and over, and we both just got emails about NW for the first time since the issues started the Friday before ch67 went up, as the entire reason I made that note was because FF actually sends the author of a fic notifications about a chapter uploading too, and I only realized it was down when I stopped getting them. And whether my emails had been turned off in the settings was the first thing I checked, and it was still on. So it sounds more like it's getting fixed a bit at a time. Especially since the pop-up was still there when I went to upload. Which sounds more like whatever they're doing to fix it is affecting various people and fics at different times, which sucks if it's true, since that means it isn't fixed.
Kennji- Actually haven't had another review from you since ch57 when you said Marzanna "needs more gainz an be more stronk" and since this was already written my mind immediately went to this, so is this enough stronk gainz for you?
She sighs tiredly as she stretches as she heads down to dinner, glancing over as she does so at Amelia Bones, who had flooed over from the safe house she was in at her request to start looking into the best ways to either get the kids out without V-Mort finding out, or mitigate the danger to them, and the best way to go about either, as well as the best way to revamp the security for Hogsmeade. That and when the woman heard, she'd practically begged to be able to help sort out Dumbledore's mess, since he was one of the three main problems in the UK, with the other two being Voldemort and the blood purists, and she wanted to help make progress on that instead of just helping sort out refugees coming to the safe houses, "Should be all done by tomorrow, right?"
Amelia rolls her head, cracking her neck, "Should be, yeah."
She nods, "Minerva has already accepted taking the Headship from me, which isn't surprising, and she's been surprisingly understanding of the fact we wanted to sort things out ourselves. Hogwarts is fine with her becoming the new Head too, after the way she denounced Dumbledore so strongly, so once we're finished up, it'll just be a simple matter of handing the wards over and then we can shift focus back to the Demon clean up and the war."
Amelia nods, "Mm. And he's mortal now, so that should be easier. Relatively speaking anyway, at least compared t-"
She's cut off by an explosion. They both whirl towards the sound, looking out one of the many windows just in time to see another spell explode against the wards. At the base surrounding the gates was a large crowd, and even from here she can see the silver masks of Death Eaters, and her significantly better eyesight can easily make out Voldemort himself at the head of the group.
Her lips press into a thin line as she activates the emergency signal in her family ring, "Or maybe we'll end up finishing up this war and then finalizing everything else." She flicks a look towards Amelia as they start to rush towards the entrance hall, "Still think you should finish revamping the security in Hogsmeade, given that the kids go there on weekends if nothing else, and it's not like the world will be magically safe just because this war finishes."
Amelia flashes her a smile, "An excellent point."
Nothing else is said as they split up. Amelia to gather up the kids so she and the teachers, and any other help she can find, can defend them easier, her to head out to the inevitable battle. While she'd fixed what Dumbledore had done to the Wardstone and that had allowed the wards to get untangled and start getting back their strength, the second part of that process would take years to complete after so many decades forced into the mess he'd made of them.
Before she even exits the doors, her grandma, grandpa, dad, mom, Uncle Vergil, Aunt Trish, Nero, Mike, and her beloved mate join her. Her dad flashes her a grin after they exit the doors and see them across the lawn, "Aww shucks. He was nice enough to come right to us! Given they still aren't responding when we say the name Voldemort, which we only avoid in places we don't want to risk them coming to, and even when they do check every now and then to see if we've stopped trying to bait them out he didn't show up himself anymore, so I was starting to think we'd have to pin down which of his ever changing rotation of bases he was hiding out in!"
Uncle Vergil makes a haughty sniff, "That's because he's an utter coward. It's not very surprising, given his stupid little name means 'flight from death', so I suppose it's to be expected from him."
She flicks a look up at the wards, "Should I just drop them and let them in? Even that group shouldn't be too much of a problem if we're all here, and honestly, given the wards are already trying to recover from the mess Dumbledore made of them, I really don't think it's good for them to fall right now. It could permanently damage them."
Aunt Trish immediately glances over, "Kat and Lady went to help Amelia in case any of the cowards slip around us, so I'd say go for it."
Murmurs of agreement ripple through the rest of her family, so she reaches for her connection to Hogwarts. She feels a flicker of hesitance after she makes her desire and vague plan clear, then a feeling of trust before it obeys. The ward isn't dropped entirely of course, neither she nor Hogwarts wants to risk any of them Apparating straight to the kids or anything, so they leave aspects like that up, but the wards directly keeping them out drop.
A flicker of amusement courses through her, "Wonder how many of them know wandless magic or have some sort of protection from their wands being taken? That part that will confiscate objects one intends to cause harm with does work on wands too after all."
That gets more than a bit of laughter from her family as they watch the Death Eaters pour in, but it's her chuckling grandpa who responds, "May be an even easier fight than anyone was expecting if that's the case. Couldn't hurt to try, though you may wanna wait until they're all in the wards so the ones in the back don't get warning and run away."
She nods, "Already planning on it."
Nothing else is said as the first Death Eaters get close enough to start trying to fire at them and her family scatters and rushes to close in. She herself circles around so she can get a line of sight on the gates, waiting until Voldemort himself draws up the rear and crosses onto the grounds. Once he has, she reaches for Hogwarts again, bringing the wards back up to full and shifting them to prevent anyone from leaving. At the same time, Hogwarts gleefully enacts the part of the wards that allows it to confiscate items, having been more than happy to just wait a moment to get them all within its range rather than being outright stopped like Dumbledore used to do.
Alarmed shouts ring out as a plethora of confiscation notifications run through her mind. Honestly, they think themselves so high and mighty, but even with the wands they weren't particularly difficult to deal with, even with their numbers.
Unlike most of her family and their straight forward cutting through the enemy lines, she all but dances through them, twisting and flipping out of the way of spell fire as she descends on Death Eater after Death Eater. Slipping around three spells as she closes to slice through a wand and the tendons on the arms here, the tendons in the legs as she stomps on the owners wand there, while vaguely towards her left her mate sidesteps spells without letting it slow him down, seeming almost to weave through his fights like a needle through thread, and off to her right her brother shields against them with his wand in one hand as he attacks with his Nephilim Blade in the other. She catches glimpses of other members of her family through the gaps periodically as well. Her dad simply bulldozing forward, Royal Guard active and protecting him without bothering to dodge. Her mom was both flinging spells rapidly, downing enemy after enemy even as she darts around to keep them from hitting her. Her cousin making spells spend themselves on bullets from his gun even as he darts forward. Her grandpa deflecting them with his sword as he steadily advances. Her Aunt Trish blasting the magic midair with shocks of electricity as she whirls through. Her uncle catching the magic with his blade and launching them back into the Death Eaters. Her grandma shrouded in a golden aura that shreds the spells before they can touch her as she smashes through them with her war hammer. It isn't long before the circle her family has spread out around them starts constricting further and further as their numbers dwindle, most falling to precise cuts to tendons and wands to down them so they can see justice in the ICW which is already fully prepared to have to deal with them since there isn't any guarantee what happened with the last war wouldn't repeat, though some of them do end up with more lethal injuries.
It doesn't take too long before it's only Voldemort and a few of his inner circle left. Even as her family descends on them, she slips her wand out as she starts cutting more tendons, and seeing an opening as Voldemort turns towards her Uncle off to her mate's left, she leans over to aim into a gap between the Death Eaters. It's nothing fancy, just a dark ripping charm resistant to healing, just in case he's quick about it.
Surrounded by spell fire from his inner circle, he doesn't realize it's coming for him until it's too late, catching it in his side as he starts to turn and cast a shield. He gasps as he falls to his knees as his side starts gushing blood as the area is torn to shreds, and screams of horror and rage ring out from the still conscious Death Eaters.
He looks down at his bloody hand, before looking up at her with a snarl, "Don't think this is over. I will return once more."
She smiles as her brother drifts to her side to cover her just in case, "Because of your Horcruxes?" His expression flickers, and she tilts her head, "The diary, ring, locket, cup, diadem, and Nagini, to name them all." His expression turns horrified and she smiles meanly, "You even had one you didn't know about, since you'd done so much damage to yourself that part broke off when that Killing Curse you tried to fire at me as a baby rebounded that crawled into Mike's scar, but even that's been dealt with." She shakes her head, "Your Horcruxes are destroyed, you yourself are dying, and your army has been all but annihilated. It's over Voldemort."
Voldemort laughs coldly, not seeming to notice the blood bubbling past his lips, then he levels the most insane look at the twins they've ever seen from the madman, "I'm so glad I took precautions then!"
His deranged smile seems to unsettle even what's left of his Death Eaters, and he presents his hand as an orb shimmers into existence. It pulses powerfully with twisted evil magic, "You see, I never truly thought I could lose, but that bastard Dumbledore said something to me about arrogance the last time we fought, so I decided to prepare a just in case present for you! One you should love since it was made by studying you! The magic contained in this will activate with my death, so you'd best enjoy your hollow victory and your lives while you can!"
Seeing their worried expressions he laughs madly, only cut off when her temper snaps, and without thinking about it, she flicks the Elder Wand out of the secondary wand holster her mom had brought her. Without any direction from her, it suddenly changes to a scythe as she's mid-slash for a spell, and a pitch black slash of energy slams into him, the numbers above him cutting in half, the two portions twisting and reforming into a zero as it hits him and he drops dead in an instant. None of her family protests her killing him as she eyes the scythe as it turns back into a wand, despite the ominous power of the orb, as there was no possible way they could have saved Voldemort and prevented his 'present' from activating as he was undoubtedly only a few moments from death anyway. Immediately, the orb cracks open and blood red light begins to spread over the ground as the earth starts shaking beneath their feet. As the light spreads, those caught within disintegrate to nothing but dust with short lived agonized screams.
While there was some of Voldemort's army still alive, the proverbial lines between friend and foe disappear in the mad rush to escape the light.
When it finally stops spreading, a hole with an opening about two hundred(1) feet in diameter is left in the wake of the light. One that was frankly horrifying.
One that opens directly into Hell.
There's a beat of stunned silence as they stare at the hoard of Demons waiting there, possibly having sensed the connection to Hell his orb made, unlike with the Qliphoth where they had no warning, and been gathering, before they suddenly surge towards the opening with howls and roars of glee.
Even as he moves forward to meet the hoard with the rest of her family, Nero shouts, "How the fuck did he open a gate and without a fucking gate at that?! The seal-!"
He's cut off by their grandpa's strained growling voice, "Only prevents the creation of a bridge between worlds. Voldemort's spell has broken the already thin barrier of separation between Limbo and Earth and forced the two planes to merge into one within the affected area. A bridge isn't necessary if there is no gap you need to cross."
Nero huffs, "Ok, but how the fuck did he make something like that?!"
It's Vergil that responds this time, "Marzanna said he took blood while she was captured. I can only assume he somehow made it after studying the Devil's ability to shift themselves between the two planes."
Guilt surges through her chest at the notion that he'd been able to make it because of her. Not that there's much time for it, as even with the more fighting oriented members of her family doing their best, with the gaping wound between the planes being so large, they certainly can't stop all of the Demons. Though she had initially hung back with Mike and Kazuto -who had made his way to her side in the rush to get away from the light from the orb-, all three of them knowing that they need to do their best not to get in the way of the stronger members of the Sparda's, as well as being able to snag as many as they can of those that inevitably get past them, but with so many it isn't long at all before they have to fight as well.
It had only taken a moment as the family had engaged for the three of them to all, somewhat reluctantly, come to the conclusion that it'd be better for them to spread back out to get as many of the ones who get past as possible. Especially since the sheer numbers means it isn't just lower Demons that her family is leaving to them, even Great Demons are getting through. Which is bad both in the sense that even they are getting through the better fighters of the family, and the fact that trying to cover as much ground as possible means they're all basically on their own against the increasing numbers.
Even the Great Demons are beginning to pile up, though she supposes there's a small mercy in the fact they were all so focused on those connected to the 'traitorous Sparda' that practically none of them are leaving entirely to wreak havoc on the world.
Barely keeping the half step ahead to stay alive even as the five Great Demons surrounding her slowly tighten her metaphorical noose as they steadily close in and deprive her of space to move and dodge, she misses the arrival of a much smaller form slipping inside her decreasing breathing room. At least until it rams into her back and slams her to the ground. Two quick blows to her arms precedes even more pain. She barely bites back a cry before lifting her gaze to find her very own Shuraba stabbed through her hands, the hand holding her blade and the boot that soon plants itself between her shoulders pinning her.
"Marzanna. How very n-nice to see my favorite t-t-t-test subject."
She glares back at him, spitting like it's the worst curse, "Agnus."
He smiles maliciously, "S-so you do r-recogn-nize me! Good."
She snarls in anger, "Like I'd forget a waste of air like you. Honestly, you should apologize to the poor plants who's oxygen you're wasted on."
He snorts, "Funny. It s-seems time has actually dulled that t-t-tongue of yours."
She flashes him a vicious smile even as she notices the Great Demons, and even the lesser ones, turn away from her, and she spares a brief though to wonder what sort of understanding Agnus has with them, "You mean how I used to suggest you take some of your instruments and run an experiment on how many you can cram up your ass? Or that you should cut your dick off and see if making yourself a Demon means you can regrow it? Of how I said someone should gut you with a rusty spoon and string you up by your own intestines?" Her smile gains a mocking edge, "Nah, I just have more important things to take my attention than the likes of you."
His face spasms as she'd known it would, his ego unable to handle the implication that he's unimportant in any way. He smiles cruelly, "And y-yet, I'm the one who has you c-caught like a bug in a t-trap."
She laughs, and she can feel that Shuraba isn't happy with the plan at all, but necessities must, so she shakes her head mockingly at him, aiming to distract him just that little bit more, "Unfortunately for you, I'm no longer a child who hardly knows what she is, much less what she's capable of." She looks at him with derisive humor, "Which is about all you're capable of handling."
His face twists with fury, "You-!"
That's as far as he gets before she does exactly the thing Shuraba was so unhappy about as she yanks her hands down, ripping the blade through them, then shoves herself up and subsequently him off of her and off balance when the foot he'd planted on her is pushed up.
Even better, he drops her lovely blade in his surprise so it's all too easy for her to snatch it up as she hops to her feet and whirls with it. It goes clean through his throat, and even as he reaches up reflexively to stem the blood flow, she stabs the blade into his heart as she steps forward before coldly whispering into his dying ear, "A pathetic unimportant side note of a death for a pathetic unimportant side note of a man."
He makes one last weak gurgle as he reaches up to try to claw at her face, his own twisted in hateful rage, but ripping Shuraba through him until it exits from the top of his head puts a stop to that swiftly enough.
She can't help but feel utter satisfaction that the disgusting man with delusions of grandeur who had both hurt Nero so badly and tormented her as a child had died such a meaningless death. She doesn't know if she's disgusted by it, by the notion of using it, or finds it fitting that with all his experiments making himself a Demon ends in nothing more than a small scalpel of a Devil Arm. She shakes the thought off as she stores it in her Devil Bringer and resolves to speak to Nero about it later.
Unfortunately, the satisfaction doesn't last long, as when she turns, while the Demons are still ignoring her, possibly having written the area off entirely after Agnus had captured her, she's left with plenty of time to realize that her family is losing badly. And even worse, given both the refuge Hogwarts had turned into, mostly for children, and the fact none of them wanted another Demonic Invasion, her family wasn't likely to back down. Especially since this wasn't like the Qliphoth, where they only needed to destroy the tree and the folded back edges would fall back into place. If they can't fix it, this would become an endless fight.
She knows that every last one of them will fight to the death if necessary.
Mounting grief meets a rising sense of worthlessness. What good was she to her family? All she really was in the end was another way to hurt them. And even if she tried to fight, there was basically nothing she could do but watch them die one by one, steadily beaten to death in a never ending futile battle against the waves of Demons. Assuming the Demons didn't notice Agnus' death and turned their attention back on her, since she knows full well that even compared to Mike and her beloved Kazuto that she was the weakest, and very likely to be the first to kick the bucket if this continues. She certainly won't be around to watch them die one by one if that happens. Her eyes squeeze shut as she desperately tries to fight back her tears.
Her eyes snap back open as she hears her beloved mate, her self proclaimed devotee, grunt in pain. She watches him barely dodge enough to avoid losing an arm, but not enough to avoid a nasty wound on his shoulder, 'No. No, I will not allow this.'
Though having it contained off to the side doesn't match the style of the open cave mindscape she's built using her Occlumancy, she's always imagined a hallway connected to the central room of her mind leading into a small circular room with her various abilities behind doors. Demonic powers behind one door, with her Devil Bringer off behind another door inside that room, an offshoot rooted in her Demonic powers, but in and of itself separate, much like all of her Styles. Directly across would be her Angelic powers. Across from each other between the two would be her magical abilities and her connection to her Nephilim blade in general even if the sentience they gained means the connection to each of the forms was mostly stored in each of their humanoid representations nowadays.
The doors were laid out like the points of a square laid over the circular room, with the hallway entry in the bottom middle of it. All the networks of rooms containing her carefully separated powers. She'd been taught to keep everything separated from childhood, even when drawing upon more than one power at a time. Always taught that her powers, especially her Demonic and Angelic, would likely cancel each other out at best, and interact in strange, potentially dangerous ways at worst. The full sentience of her Nephilim Blade was a result of this, and a luckily unharmful one at that.
In that moment though, she flings open every single door and draws every ounce of her power to flood her, allowing it all to interact freely, and fuck the consequences.
Years ago, when she gained her Devil Bringer, something had shifted within her. Now in the surging tidal wave of chaos inside of her, something shifts yet again. Without the clear direction from when she had reached for Kirito with her everything all the way back in SAO focusing it all, a scale pops into her head, dead center in the circle of the room of doors to her various powers, and her Demonic energy and the various Styles it often takes the form of, Devil Trigger, and Devil Bringer flow to one of the plates, on the other, the only thing to sit is her Angelic energy. It crackles through her system and reaches for her other arm.
'In all things balance.'
She doesn't know where either the scale or words come from, but given that art from the Nephilim almost always shows them holding a scale, she's going to go out on a limb and say that it was the instinct of a Nephilim itself speaking to her.
To that extent, she neither attempts to stop it, nor is surprised when the Angelic energy crackles around her right arm before it seems to peel away and turn to ash, the hand of her human form permanently destroyed. In its place seemingly having been revealed under the peeling ash, though she knows that isn't actually true, her arm has turned a faint metallic gold, subtly shimmering, with pure white carefully manicured nails at the ends of her fingers, and a deeper golden color radiating from the palm side of her fingers and hand and continuing down a tidy split that goes down her hand to her wrist, then gently curves and narrows before it ends at where her elbow bone is, and finally a sort of golden gem looking thing on the center of the back of her hand.
It was certainly a balanced contrast to her jaggedly pitch-black plated left arm, with its dark red glow emanating from the equally craggy tears, and claw like nailed Devil Bringer.
She supposes, since her grandma is a Seraphim, then that would make this a Seraphim Bringer. Her new Seraphim Bringer joins her Angelic powers on the scales, making them more balanced.
Still not enough.
The energy rushes through her whole body, and she knows immediately what it's attempting to do. Her grandma's only non-humanoid trait was her six wings when she brings them out, so it's not meant to exist, but she knows, beyond a shadow of a doubt that she was about to Seraphim Trigger.
Since they don't look anything like what the human Bible thinks they do, she's more than a bit curious as to what that will look like, but this too, she doesn't fight. Angelic energy surges through her forcing her body into a change she's not supposed to possess.
Given that she can feel that her powers need a few moments to settle, she examines herself and her new form. Perhaps the most interesting thing is the wings, or the change to them rather. She can't help but be a bit curious, since there actually are eyes lining the tops of each silvery wing, which was closer to biblically accurate than she'd been expecting.
It actually implies that either much like the Devil, the Seraphim had lost their pure form to mixing with other species of Angels and somehow a hint of what they're supposed to look like cropped up in human religion, or what it thinks they look like had influenced her Seraphim Trigger -if that's what it should be called-, since it isn't supposed to exist, and her powers literally had to create it. Taking advantage of the eyes, which can absolutely see given how many different perspectives she was viewing, she turns some to examine herself.
And promptly very nearly bursts into laughter despite the situation.
On her forehead is a neat line of cross-shaped splits in the skin, each of them emanating pale golden light, which gathers like whisps before coalescing into a circle just above her head.
A halo. She has an actual fucking halo.
Beyond that, there isn't much to note, since there isn't anything like horns and the like, just more metallic golden skin faintly shimmering when the light hits it right and silver lips, glowing blue eyes, and whereas her Devil Trigger makes her hair silver, her Seraphim Trigger has turned her hair to… honestly it looks like a galaxy, surprisingly dark colors for an Angelic form, but the primarily black color streaked through with deep blues and purples and the way it glimmers and winks like stars brings nothing else to mind.
But while her family had been holding their own long enough for her to examine herself as her powers' volatility from the new ability settles, the situation needs to be resolved. She will be the first person to tell you that she's one of the weakest of her family, but with her newfound power, she turns her attention back to the rift and the desperate fight taking place as her uncle, mom, and grandpa all shout back and forth over the sounds of the battlefield the rift has created, desperately trying to spitball an idea of how to close it once more.
Still not enough. Maybe her newfound power will bolster their frantic defense of Earth, but it isn't enough.
She releases her Seraphim Trigger as she turns her attention inward and eyes the scale. Balance is all well and good. But she needs something more. Though it's a foolish idea, she takes that scale and imagines the plates are slightly curved in towards the center to make incredibly shallow bowls. She imagines tubing running from a hole in the center of each of them for her powers to flow down into a central cylinder.
Angelic and Demonic things, their power, their society, even their metals may not mix normally. But she is desperate, and if her ancient Nephilim brethren can figure out a way to mix the metals safely, then she's damn well desperate enough to try to get the power to mix as well.
For a moment the power all seethes in the cylinder and bubbles almost violently through her, and a colossal pressure begins to build in her as magic starts to pulse around her, lingering like a predator ready to pounce. For a moment, she thinks she's made a gargantuan mistake, thinks she might very well explode from the two opposing powers clashing in her. But just as she reaches for them frantically, hoping to be able to re-separate them before it kills her, the storm within her settles as they suddenly find equilibrium.
Another crackle of the mixed energy burns through her, even as she feels magic lunge for her, and by the end her form shifts once more. Given that her body needs a little bit again, she observers herself. First mentally, trying to figure out why the hell magic had reached for her, not that it takes very long to work out. Magic took advantage of the situation it seems, and got rid of what little human blood she had, making her a pure Nephilim. They should probably still craft a ritual just in case, but it wasn't nearly as pressing a matter if they could just purge non-Nephilim blood from themselves. Luckily, she hadn't lost her human magic in the process, which wasn't too surprising given the fact it was literally in a Devil's base abilities to absorb various forms of power that weren't native to them. It wouldn't have let her lose an ability. With that out of the way, she turns her attention to examining herself physically. She still has six wings, but while they're the feathery white of her Seraphim Trigger, they have the large bat like shape of the upper two wings and the slimmer more straight lower four wings of her Devil Trigger, the lower of which she still thinks are shaped remarkably like the Spriggan wings in ALO. The upper wings also now have the eyes along the upper ridges where the bone is beneath the skin and feathers from her Seraphim Trigger. Which may or may not be a permanent change. She'd have to check later.
She absolutely takes advantage of them to look herself over. Again, her hair looks more like a galaxy, a resemblance that's only grown with the added streaks of silver. She also has the rough black natural plating of her Devil Trigger, but this time it's over the faintly metallic gold skin of her Seraphim Trigger, and her eyes also seem to be a combination, being the blue of her Seraphim Trigger with the black sclera of her Devil Trigger. Though instead of the silver of the former of the two Triggers, her lips are the black of the latter, and she also has the horns starting from behind her ears and sweeping towards her chin from said Trigger. And she still, hilariously, has a halo. Which honestly only makes her hair look even more like a galaxy, both from the wisps of golden light and the halo itself around her hair, but also the fact that the way the light of it shines on said hair makes those glimmers and winks of light look even more star-like. Finally, a tattoo looking mark of a scale has appeared on her forehead, with her eyebrows serving as the balancing plates, the base trailing down her nose.
Most surprising of all however, was the fact that the upper wings, for all that their outline still more closely resembles a bat and retains the eyes, has an upper ridge in the shape of an arm, complete with elbow bend and hands at the end. And they're entirely transparent and ghostly.(2) On top of that, the hands they have are both Bringers, or at least they resemble them, though they're each on the opposite side of her actual Bringer of their respective types.
It actually makes sense, in a certain way, for the ghostly hands to be opposite. After all, balance is everything. And if she was going to get an extra set of hands, even if they're ghostly, then it makes sense to round out the sets of her old hands. An Angelic ghostly left hand to make a pair with her flesh and blood Angelic right hand. A ghostly Demonic right for her flesh and blood left.
She turns back to the fighting. It really was mostly the nigh unending numbers that were the biggest issue, though the fact there are Great Demons sprinkled in obviously doesn't help. Honestly though, the biggest issue her family has is the rift. But how does one go about cutting the merge back into two separate things?
A practical rain of blue streaks draws her attention to where her uncle is using the special slash ability of Yamato almost excessively.
She blinks, then her eyes narrow. Yamato.
She faintly feels a memory flicker up as she watches the spatial slashes, a memory of Uncle Vergil cutting a portal into existence and hears her dad's voice echoing over it, "If Yamato can divide…"
Yamato.
But… her uncle was using it to greatly reduce the work of the others, cutting down hoards of lesser -and even a few Great- Demons in record time, which frees her family up to focus more on the Great Demons. She can't pull that away. As she racks her mind for a way forward, something occurs to her.
She looks down at her Seraphim Bringer. If the Devil Bringer can absorb, and if in all things there is balance, then logically, her Seraphim Bringer can produce.
She turns her attention back to the pools of energy around her that she started sensing when she Nephilim Triggered, to continue with the naming pattern. With ease, she reaches out for one that's incredibly familiar from training, boosting the power levels released, and mimics it with her right hand. She's swiftly proven right in her reasoning, though the blade that appears is ethereal rather than solid, but her equally ghostly right hand reaches over her shoulder and grabs its hilt just fine.
With a single slash of the ethereal blade, the Demons surrounding her family fall dead. Physically untouched by her, her ghostly hands, or the ethereal blade, but cut to pieces by glowing blue lines in the air, too innumerable to count, yet never touching her family, even if they have to curve around them to do so. Which, she notes, is not something the original source she's borrowing from is capable of. And it is borrowed.
She knows instinctively that as soon as she lets go of either the pool she's drawing from or her current state that she won't be able to do it anymore. At least not unless she re-enters this state of being and draws on its power again. Or perhaps if her Devil heritage lets her learn the signature itself in a more permanent capacity, sort of like a Style. Assuming the ghostly blade and its ability doesn't just become a Style anyway. Which makes a lightning flash thought, wondering what would happen if she absorbed the ghostly blade with her Devil Bringer, would it return to her own raw energy? Or would the mimicry she used her Seraphim Bringer to produce make it more like absorbing Yamato itself, either leaving her with the power permanently or at least able to call up the ghostly blade whenever she liked.
For now she's firmly holding onto the boosted borrowed power of Yamato though, as the entire battlefield stops dead. Both her family and the Demons still in the process of crawling out of the rift that had survived. The entire battlefield turns as one too look at her, and a dead silence lingers for a few moments before Nero murmurs, "Well… Someone's learned a new trick."
She flicks a glance at him before turning her gaze to the rift, and before anything can pick back up, she swings with the ghostly Yamato again and cuts at the rift itself. Red lightning crackles around the cut, and her ghostly left hand shoots out, extending further than it should be capable of, and digs its nails into the split between the two planes that her Yamato had reopened, swiftly working its fingers into the gap and widening it.
Upon seeing it, the Demons howl with fury, and a Great Demon she'd ignored as it wasn't close to her family when she did her first cutting frenzy lunges towards her. It seems remarkably slow, given that it's a Geryon, which is where the Quicksilver style comes from. At least it does right up until a frantic brush of Kazuto's strangely slow mind against hers has her realizing that her perception has sped up, and a quick mental glance at her powers lets her know that anything she's picked up and has a connection to, such as her Styles or Devil Arms, has also had its power boosted, and all of her Styles are active at the same damn time.
In other words, it's not that it's slow, it's that the Quicksilver her dad got from one of its kind and that she later had managed to absorb the energy signature of from him is both active and boosted. In short, her Quicksilver is faster than the one it possesses.
Briefly, it occurs to her that she's skyrocketed herself straight from being the weakest in her family to being the strongest. At least in that moment anyhow. She's certainly much closer to the divinity her mate sappily attributes her to have at least.
All that being said, while it was good at cutting space, as a weapon it's more meant for precision, and even with her heightened perception, she doesn't have time for the delicate work of offing it with her ghostly Yamato. So she releases its power as she brings her Seraphim Bringer up again as she reaches for another familiar pool and another equally familiar ghostly hilt begins to extend from her palm. Her Nephilim Trigger hand reaches for that one now that it's not occupied with Yamato and yanks it out and up just in time for the charging giant Demonic horse to impale itself on a ghostly Rebellion, which with a bit of help from Grandpa her dad had figured out how to unmerge from himself.
Her family finally shakes their surprise at the turn of events off, and her grandparents put themselves directly between her and the rift as they do their damndest to keep the Demons that surge up and out of the rift and towards her and her alone in the wake of the Great Demon off of her while she tries to re-separate the edges of the planes that have merged into one. Immediately, the battle breaks back out once more, though this time there's less of a frantic search for what the hell they can do and more steely determination in her family now that a goal is firmly in mind.
She turns her attention fully onto the rift, trusting her family to do their parts. Once her ghostly hand works into the gap far enough, she grips the edge and starts hauling up on the Earth plane, she releases Rebellion's power as her other hand surges out to grab Hell and starts pushing it down and away.
Desperate frustration fills her as she tries to force the planes to separate. She can feel in her bones, in the very core of her being that it's possible, but she can't. She feels like Atlas trying to hold up the sky, but she's holding a world and not just one but two and she's trying to push them apart, and she's never been the strongest has she? She usually can't even match her family in raw power even if in this moment things were different but she still isn't the slightest bit capable of surpassing the mythological being that holds the sky itself.
The feedback from the red electricity around the edges of the rift begins to burn, burn, burn, up her ghostly hands and arms, into her body, straight to the very core of her being and powers. A sob of agony wrenches itself free from her throat. She's going to break under the strain and the scorching heat, but she can't just give up, both for the sake of everyone and because her family is counting on her.
Hands settle on her shoulders and her attention snaps back to the world at large as she looks back with tear filled eyes. She finds herself looking into her dad's exhausted but determined and loving gaze, "Come on kiddo. We Sparda's are family, and our family has always shared the weight of our burdens. You think that's gonna change just because in this case it's almost literally the weight of two worlds? I don't think so."
Her breath catches as in the edges of her vision she sees another set of ethereal hands shoot forward to grab the edges of the rift. Her gaze shoots over to find Nero in his own Nephilim Trigger giving her a strained grin before turning his attention to the task at hand. Off to the side, she sees her mate and twin, both having gained Devil and Seraphim Bringers at some point, concentrating hard. After a couple moments, ghostly hands appear from her mate's back in yet another Nephilim Trigger, immediately diving into the fray as well. He murmurs something to Mike that has him nodding and his face relaxing though he's obviously still concentrating. It doesn't take long before he's helping out with his own hands. They both smile at her before they too turn their focus onto the gaping wound between worlds.
The strain is considerably less now, but it slackens even further at the same time as she sees flickers of blue light out of the corner of her eye. Turning back she finds Aunt Trish using Yamato to copy her earlier actions of surgically cutting between the merging world's and steadily making it easier to pry them apart one hard fought for centimeter at a time.
Though not all of her slashes were directed at the merging fabric of the planes. Some of them were directed at the Demons still trying to come through the doorway, focusing on pushing them back when possible and only diverting her attention to killing them when necessary. She wasn't the only one doing such either. Surrounding the massive gaping hole seems to be every single magical from the castle and Hogsmeade, who as they didn't mean harm to the actual denizens of the castle wouldn't have been held out by the wards, flinging spells into the hole and the Demons trying to force their way to freedom with wild abandon.
As she gapes around at the unexpected help, her gaze falls on Kat and Amelia Bones standing side by side, both of which flash her determined smiles, before turning back to the work in front of them, and she knows beyond a shadow of a doubt who rallied the magicals in the castle and Hogsmeade to their aid.
Abruptly, her brain decides to re-engage and ask why Trish is using Yamato rather than her uncle. While she possesses enough precision for this, her uncle was more precise yet, and could help even more. Seeking him out with her eyes, she quickly finds him clutching his arms as a frankly massive amount of Demonic and Angelic energy gather around them.
She's only watching for a few moments before his arms shift into Seraphim and Devil Bringers and moments later he himself is in his own Nephilim Trigger as triumph flashes over his face. Almost immediately her dad's grip on her shoulders slackens and with a glance back she immediately knows Vergil and he are connected with their twin bond.
Her dad's face clears and he briefly lets go of her and steps back. His arms light up with power for a few seconds before his arms also shift, which was likely what Vergil was sending him, the abbreviated 'How to Bringer and Nephilim Trigger without human blood disrupting the natural balance within you'.
The Bringers might not be necessary, but since they have no way of knowing if they're part of the process and are pressed for time and therefore can't experiment, it makes sense that everyone would choose to just replicate her evolution towards it.
A moment later, her dad smiles at her and squeezes her shoulder one more time before stepping up beside her and uncle Vergil who's just reaching them, "Like I said. Our family sticks together. No matter what."
Uncle Vergil gives her a gentle reassuring smile before they both enter the fray, her dad applying his massive natural strength to focus fully on re-separating the two planes, and holy shit. She knew her dad was strong but just him alone throwing his weight into it halves the still massive if now distributed strain.
Uncle Vergil's assistance is split between helping pull the two planes apart and using Yamato's ability to help Trish with her job, and fucking hell, if Uncle Vergil was dangerous with Yamato, he was a whole other level of beast with the amplified ability with the ghostly sword in his flesh and blood hands even as his ghostly hands help with the rift.
She couldn't say how long it takes as they pry the planes apart, but with a sudden lurch that feels like the ground caving beneath her hands while she's propped up with them and a loud cannon blast of a snapping noise, they break away from each other and the hole disappears.
From there it's just a matter of cleaning up the rest of the Demons that got through before they could close it, but she doesn't even get a chance to do anything before Uncle Vergil is killing the whole lot with a few lightning fast swings of his ghostly Yamato.
Without a word, she collapses onto the ground as her exhaustion suddenly slams into her and buckles her knees, and she's far from the only one. While her grandparents, dad, and uncle manage to stay on their feet, they seem to be the only ones. Barring her mate anyway, but it's less him staying on his feet and more stubbornly forcing back his collapse before he's back at her side.
She looks around, eyes catching on a Death Eater body nearby. She still doesn't know what all it means to be the Master of Death, but she could figure it out later, strangely though there were still numbers above his head, but they've turned black. She's still not certain how the ability works, but she thinks the red numbers Dumbledore had was time added to his lifespan from the Philosopher's Stone. The vivid green everyone had was the lifespan they could potentially have if nothing killed them early. The black numbers… The black was the years they could have had that were cut short.
She tears her gaze away, adamantly ignoring the numbers floating above every person and body, and sighs as she leans against her beloved devotee, utterly exhausted but content that the war against that psychopath Voldemort is over. The world isn't perfect of course. The Demons may have been beaten back today, but it was only a matter of time before they showed their ugly mugs again. Not to mention, now that they had definitive proof that her family wasn't human, the British magicals would probably be after their heads, despite the fact they just saved their asses and that they were supposed to be cleaning up their act. Change may be inevitable, but it wasn't likely to come to them anyone soon, even with everything that had happened.
It didn't matter much, with their skills, durability, and healing capabilities, it probably wouldn't be much of a problem for her family, and even if it was they could always just take advantage of their ridiculous longevity to wait until the country changed and stay away in the meantime. However, despite all that, Voldemort had been dealt with, and there's a certain satisfaction in the fact that the psychopath so obsessed with immortality had done himself in and in a last attempt to take the world with him at that. An attempt that failed, making his death meaningless. Hell, technically since they were walking away with Nephilim and Seraphim Triggers and the Seraphim Bringers they'd come out of it stronger than ever, so all his death had achieved was making enemies he hated significantly more powerful.
The war her brother was being forced to fight in was over and they'd all made it out ok, and the Demons had been beaten back for the time being. That was more than good enough for her just now.
Her attention is pulled away as her cousin staggers over, apparently having gotten up without her noticing at some point, and her grandma and uncle come over as well, her uncle scrutinizing her as her grandma asks in concern, "Are you alright sweetheart? It… took a little bit for Nero and the others to take some of the burden from you."
She closes her eyes, turning her attention inward, "I… think so? It's hard to tell with how much everything kinda hurts."
Nero groans as he flops down, "Tell me about it. You'd think being ghostly we couldn't get hurt with those hands, but the feedback from that red electricity burned." He eyes her, "And it lessened with each person who started helping, so I can only imagine it was even worse for you before I started helping."
Her grandma makes a concerned noise as she crouches down and holds a hand to her side as it lights up so she can assess her currentstate with her power, "What kind of burning?"
She shrugs, "I have no idea. It just burned. I couldn't tell you exactly what was burning and how, just that it went straight to the core of my being."
Her uncle touches grandma's shoulder, but she shakes her head, "I may need help if it's more than just… some sort of phantom pain, but I'm good for now."
He nods, then turns his attention away from grandma and eyes her, "What on earth was that scythe? It didn't actually cut Voldemort when it slashed him, but he dropped dead immediately."
She looks away, brows furrowing, "That…" She lifts her gaze to watch her dad start rounding up the alive Death Eaters with Amelia and some other help, even as she tries very hard not to watch her grandpa and Aunt start collecting the bodies and setting them out of the way, "Ever since I got the third of the Hallows I've been seeing glowing green numbers over everyone. Since the younger the person is, the bigger the number, I… think it's how many years they potentially have left." She glances over at her surprised grandma, "It's how I knew Dumbledore had the Philosopher's Stone. Above the thirty he had, which was grayed out like when a button is disabled? There was a red twenty with a plus in front of it. I was assuming the numbers were gray because any additional aging was halted, and the red numbers were what was added by the Stone." She shrugs again, "Guess I was right since he had it. And given he didn't look any younger from my understanding, I assume he was being subtle with its use." She feels a bit uncomfortable still, but it the only explanation she has wouldn't make sense without it, "The dead… they have numbers too, and they aren't at zero, which is why I'm assuming it's how long they could live rather than how long they're destined to live or such nonsense that people who don't get that there are multiple roads of fate one can go down. Their numbers haven't disappeared, they're just black, which… I assume shows how many years they didn't get to live."
Nero straightens up, brows pinched as he looks at her, "That… doesn't sound very fun. None of it really, but to see how many years someone lost…"
She shrugs uncomfortably, "No, it really isn't…" There's a pause, then she shakes herself, "Anyway, when that… energy beam slash or whatever you wanna call it hit him, his numbers were what were cut, and the two halves reformed into a zero, and that's when he dropped dead, so I… think that slash cut through the time he had left."
Her Uncle hums in thought. Uncomfortable with that too, she changes the subject, "Did you guys hear it too? When you changed as well?"
Her grandma gives her a confused look, which flicks around at the others as they all nod. Her Uncle shrugs at her as grandma's gaze lands on him, "We took down the walls keeping all our powers well away from each other. As soon as they were free, an image of a scale popped into my head, and I heard my own voice in my head say 'In all things balance' which I definitely wasn't the one who thought." He glances at them, and they all nod, "Which, since it was apparently exactly the same for all of us, I'm going to assume it was our Nephilim instincts themselves."
Her grandma gets a thoughtful look, and she's quiet for a few moments, before shaking herself, "And the golden skin and all that?"
She shrugs, tugging up her Angelic powers easily which crackles over her. Though it technically hasn't changed anything given the Bringer, she lifts her hand to examine it, "A Seraphim Trigger, or at least that's what I've been calling it mentally." She looks up at her surprised grandma, "Which is a little more biblically accurate than I was expecting, though I couldn't say if it was just my mind subconsciously taking notions from my memories since it had to build it and the others just followed suit because they got the notion from me on what it's vaguely 'supposed' to look like, or if it points to the Seraphim also going through significant changes over the millennium like the Devils, as Urizen showed us, and some details bleeding through."
Her grandma gains another thoughtful look, "That's certainly something to look into." She tilts her head briefly, "Among all the other things tonight has given us to look into."
She sighs tiredly as she leans more heavily against Kazuto, "Sure. But not right now. Now I just wanna rest."
Her grandma smiles at her, "You've certainly earned it honey. To be honest… while we were trying to come up with ideas, I don't think we would've figured anything out if you hadn't managed to awaken those new rather useful abilities."
She hums, then leans her head on Kazuto's shoulder, eyes already slipping closed. There was so much to do later. They had to finish with the clean up, help Amelia pounce on the Ministry and start wrangling it under control before other people stick their noses in and make things more complicated than they already were, and also figure out what the hell it means to be the Master of Death beyond what she's seen if there's more, not to mention working out the details of everything to do with their new Seraphim and Nephilim powers. She also wants to call Voldemort's soul with the Resurrection Stone later, just to rub it in his face that his last present only managed to kill Death Eaters. All that could wait though. Right now?
Right now she was going to leave things to the more well off members of her family and rest. Maybe take a nap on her beloved devotee's shoulder. Everything else could wait.
Second AN: Hate to potentially disappoint some of you, but the fight with Voldemort and the Death Eaters was never really going to be interesting, given that this is the Sparda family they're facing. Even if it was just Marzanna it wouldn't have been wildly interesting and given the Orb and the Hell merge, it was never going to be. They may be a big deal in the Harry Potter universe, but they're practically an afterthought for Marzanna, the biggest issue they made for her and her family was in the fact that there are only so many Sparda's, so they can't be everywhere to protect people from them. The climax has been, perhaps not from the beginning, but for a very long time the Orb he made from taking Marzanna's blood and awakening the Nephilim Trigger.
(1): About 60 meters for metric readers.
(2): Don't know if my Devil May Cry can readers were wondering about it, but as you're probably realizing at about this point from the description of the ghostly arm wings, while Nero had no reason for his particular transformation at the end of DMC5, tweaking it and using elements of it absolutely suited me.