Of Alliances & Assimilation

by W.Alderson21

You'd expect the life of Raylix Gremory, born in the middle of the Great War, the second son of Zeoticus and Venelana and the younger brother of Sirzechs to be... an interesting one, right? Well, you'd be right, but who would've guessed that it's turned out like THIS? Rated M for the usual stuff.

3. I-3: The End of One War

Will Raylix give the world dis pear too?

I... uh... hmm... HEY LOOK, A DISTRACTION! *plays One Winged Angel and runs in the other direction*

---

"I'm getting a whole battalion?"

It had been a couple of weeks since the Devils and Lilim had succeeded in closing the portal to Hell opened by the Angels, and driven them back to Heaven. Thanks to the efforts of Sirzechs, Serafall, Ajuka and Falbium, the Divine Dragon (a sub-species of Dragon with Holy capabilities, who seemed to be allied with Heaven) that had been sent to destroy as many Devils and Lilim as possible had been beaten back to whence it came. This, as well as the fact that there were no more Angels in Hell anymore (for the time being) meant that the battle had been hailed as an overall crushing victory for the Devils and Lilim, in spite of the casualties suffered during the battle.

Sirzechs himself was in his room at Zeoticus and Venelana's residence, soundly asleep on one of the rare days that he was at home, while his brother had received some... surprising news.

"This seems a little... fast." Sirzechs' 16-year-old little brother remarked, shifting slightly awkwardly on his feet. Zeoticus, who was sat down at the dining-room table and had been eating breakfast before Raylix had come downstairs, hungry for some morning sustenance.

"Well to be frank, Raylix," Zeoticus answered, taking a sip from a cup of tea that sat on the table in front of him. "I didn't have much choice in the matter. Many of the best higher-up commanding officers- both from us and the Lilim- died during the last battle you were involved in, and things haven't been getting much better since." he put down his cup of tea and rubbed his temple with one hand, sighing. "It's been decided that the Devils and Lilim that served under said higher-up commanding officers are being divided up and placed under the command of any surviving officers that have proven their worth enough." He leant back in his chair and looked over at Raylix. "You should be proud, Raylix. Really."

"I am, Father, I am!" Raylix replied. He realised, a second after he had said those words, that said words had probably come out a bit louder than he really intended to let them come out. However, Zeoticus showed no reaction to his younger son's raised voice, so he continued. "It's just... that isn't the only thing I'm feeling."

"And that's absolutely fine." Venelana's voice sounded from almost right behind Raylix. Surprised, Raylix jumped aside as his mother came into the room, clad in seemingly nothing but a light purple dressing gown, which strained against certain parts of her body. Venelana turned towards her younger son, seemingly completely ignoring the light blush that had formed on said younger son's face, and continued. "Raylix, those conflicted feelings you're having about this new responsibility? They're completely valid and expected. Honestly, I'd be more surprised if you didn't have those feelings at all, and were just ready to dive right into having several times more soldiers than you're used to under your command."

"Your mother's right, Raylix." Zeoticus replied, standing up and walking over to Venelana, delivering her a morning kiss when he got to her. "Any feelings of anxiety or worry that you might be having about this are a good marker that you, to be blunt, realise the possibility of failing miserably with the battalion that's being put together for you. I'm not going to beat around the bush with you, that IS a possibility, as it is with everything we do."

"I know..." Raylix mumbled, looking down at the ground for a few seconds before looking back at his parents.

"However, Raylix, I'm certain that you won't." Venelana spoke up, taking a couple of steps away from her husband and towards Raylix, smiling as he looked up at her (while doing his best to keep his eyes away from her exceptionally pronounced and lovely-looking breasts...) "Your father is, too."

"I am." Zeoticus replied, stepping forward as well. "And I've got some advice for you too, Raylix. In regards to what you're feeling. All the worry, anxiousness, fear?"

Raylix nodded.

"Don't forget those feelings." Zeoticus continued. "Or at least, don't forget the possibilities that cause those feelings. Your desire to avoid those possibilities will help drive your decision-making within the heat of battle, and guide you and those under your command to victory... or at least, survival to fight for another victory another day. Understand, son?"

"I... think so." Raylix replied, a small smile coming across his features. "Thanks, Father."

"No problem." Zeoticus replied, leaning forward and wrapping his arms around his younger son, pulling him into a hug. "Feel better, now?"

"Mmhmm." Raylix hummed, nodding.

"Good." Zeoticus answered, pulling back from the hug that he started after a few seconds. "Now, let's get you some breakfast, since I'm sure that's what you came down here to get, right?"

Raylix nodded again, with Zeoticus retreating to begin putting together a simple morning meal for his younger son.

"Well, with that out of the way, Raylix," Venelana spoke, sitting down in a chair next to the one that Zeoticus had been previously sat down in. "You know you're going to need some Devils or Lilim to help you with commanding your new battalion, right? Do you have anyone in mind?"

Raylix nodded, yet again.

"Yeah, he remarked, pulling up another chair and sitting down in it. "I... think I've got a couple of Devils in mind to help me.

"Good." Venelana replied, extending her hand towards the counter that Zeoticus was working at, and putting together two cups of tea from across the room before teleporting both back to her and Raylix, and giving one of the cups to Raylix before drinking from the one she had given to herself, smiling as Raylix thanked her before taking a couple of gulps himself.

The smell of Zeoticus' cooking then began to slowly permeate the kitchen/dining room as Raylix's father continued putting the breakfast meal together for Raylix. Not even ten minutes later, Zeoticus had finished making Raylix his breakfast, and served it to him before sitting back down, smiling as Raylix tucked in and hummed, clearly enjoying the meal.

---

1519

For the first time in quite a long time, unquestionably good news was passing throughout the Underworld, among the Devils and Lilim.

One of the best things to happen (from the Devils' and Lilim's point of view) had come to pass: in the aftermath of a particularly awful attempt to assault Gid, the capital city of the Underworld, the Fallen Angels had been beaten all the way back to their territory within the Underworld, and were forced to surrender to the Devils. After their embarrassing defeat against the combined forces of the Devils and Lilim, Azazel had capitulated and sued for an end to direct hostilities with the dominant races of the Underworld, which Lucifer had agreed to. Soon after, the Fallen Angels had agreed to end direct hostilities with their unfallen brethren, effectively withdrawing from the war.

The news that the Devils and Lilim were no longer fighting a war against two separate enemies anymore was, understandably, a cause for jubilation among the two races. With very few exceptions, many Devils and Lilim had retreated from the front lines, and were simply enjoying the fact that, rather than two, they only had one foe left to fight: Heaven.

Raylix, Sabemka and Tomosei were among the many Devils and Lilim that were out enjoying themselves. Raylix, now 33 years old but still not physically a day older than 20 due to the way that Devils physically aged, reached behind himself to scratch an itch that had formed on his ass as he lay on the ground, with Sabemka and Tomosei (the two individuals that Raylix had chosen as his co-commanders within the battalion that he had been formed for him 17 years ago) lying beside him. Raylix and Sabemka were talking to each other while Tomosei had a book in her hand, and read through it while providing her own occasional contributions to the conversation.

"You ever considered further incorporating kicks into your fighting style, Sabemka?" Raylix asked, looking over at his friend and fellow commander.

"Not really, no." Sabemka replied, looking down at his own feet before looking over at Raylix for a second, and then re-focusing his gaze on the dark purple Underworld sky that glistened above them every day. "Why?"

"Just something I thought of, really." Raylix remarked, sitting up. "It's something that I think would work pretty well for you, considering how strong you are with your fists. Both from a strength and from a skill-based point of view, of course."

"You think so?" Sabemka sat up as well, a rather thoughtful expression on his face as he looked down at his legs again. "It'd take a lot of training to learn to fight as naturally with my feet as well as I do as with my hands. Never mind learning to use both at the same time."

"You're not THAT limited in the brain department, Emka, I'm sure you'll be able to figure it out." Tomosei replied, her eyes flicking over to Sabemka as he got to his feet. "Plus, kicks are far stronger than punches, so with your already-considerable strength, you'd be able to take out Angels way easier with kicks than with punches."

"Don't I already take out Angels and Fallen Angels easily enough with my fists, though?" Sabemka asked, curling his hands into fists before throwing a couple of punches at an imaginary opponent (presumably an Angel) before following up with a spinning kick. However, due to not being used to carrying out such an attack, he stumbled, almost losing balance in the aftermath of his kick.

"Exactly." Tomosei replied, holding back a giggle at her friend's almost-failure to keep himself upright, as Raylix got to his feet.

"Come on, Emka, no time to start like now." Raylix spoke, holding out a hand that Sabemka took after a couple of seconds, allowing the younger Devil to pull him to his feet. "Maybe don't try anything too fancy at first, just some kicks. Maybe a small kick-combo or two. And please try not to kick my head off."

Sabemka let out a chuckle as he got into an attacking stance, and walked slowly towards Raylix.

"Got it, got it." he replied. "Here I come!"

Sabemka then broke into a run towards Raylix and, once close enough, span around to build up momentum then swung a heavy kick at Raylix's side. Seeing the attack coming, Raylix raised a hand up to where Sabemka's foot was coming at and formed a barrier out of his demonic power to block the kick. The barrier held up against Sabemka's kick without breaking or taking any kind of major damage, but the force of the kick was still enough to send Raylix skidding to his left (as the kick came at him from the right), coming to a stop around the time that Sabemka landed back on the ground.

Raylix was fast enough to both dispel the barrier to his right before pulling up another barrier in front of him as Sabemka came at him from the front, swinging a kick at his lower left leg. Raylix had to quickly move the barrier to his left side to block Sabemka's kick, and then jump up into the air just as leg met barrier. Using his eight Devil wings to gain extra airtime and fly over Sabemka's head, he landed on the other side of his friend's body just in time to see another spinning kick coming at his head.

Raylix wasn't quick enough to pull up another barrier, with the speed that Sabemka's foot was coming at his head and how close it already was to him, so he elected to move his hand up to directly catch the foot flying at him. However, though Raylix was definitely physically strong, he wasn't strong enough to completely stop Sabemka's foot from crashing into his head and sending him stumbling, same as Sabemka had done moments before. Though thanks to Raylix having caught Sabemka's foot as he kicked his head, it didn't hurt as much as it could have.

"Heh, not bad." Raylix remarked, stretching a little bit and getting himself into a defensive stance again as Sabemka approached, smiling with the satisfaction that came with succeeding as he walked towards him again. "Don't stop now!" Raylix cried, giving a 'come on!' gesture as Sabemka broke into another run. Raylix fired a bolt of demonic energy at his running friend, which Sabemka easily dodged before diving at Raylix, bodily grabbing him around the waist as he did so.

Holding Raylix by his shirt with one hand was easy enough for Sabemka, allowing him to punch Raylix in the face a couple of times to daze him slightly, before he flung his friend and commander up into the air. Spreading his four Devil wings, Sabemka jumped after Raylix and performed two quick mid-air kicks, one after the other, keeping Raylix stunned as the pair of them dropped to the ground. Before Raylix could right himself, Sabemka had dashed towards him yet again, and after building up momentum with a quick couple of spins, launched into a series of spinning kicks that all landed on or around Raylix's face and upper body as Sabemka moved up into the air, practically carrying Raylix with him via his kick-combo, which ended with a powerful axe-kick that sent Raylix down to the ground again.

"Urrrgh..." Raylix moaned, as Sabemka landed beside him. He picked himself up off the ground and gingerly touched his face, wincing slightly as he already felt it beginning to bruise. "Uh, Tomo?"

"Hm?" Tomosei looked up, and let out a small snort through her nose at the sight of Raylix's messed-up face. "Alright, alright." she spoke, by way of answer, as she summoned her staff to her with a wave of her hand. She focused some healing magic through one end of the staff towards Raylix and his face, which Raylix felt the effects of almost instantly. Even with his hand on the seconds-old bruise on his face, he could feel it going down just as quickly as it had come up, back to the point that it was good as new.

Raylix opened his mouth to thank her, but a magic-circle appeared by his ear before he could even start, indicating that he had a call. Zeoticus and Venelana's younger son touched the circle on his ear, answering the call.

"Hello? …Huh. …Seriously, now? …Right. I'll be right there. See you."

"What's up?" Tomosei asked, standing up and sending her book through a transportation-circle via a wave of her hand. "Who was calling?"

"Mother." Raylix replied, opening a transportation-circle of his own. "Turns out that Lucifer's called every available Devil, Incubus and Succubus to his and Lilith's castle in Gid, right now."

"Wait, right now?" Sabemka asked, widening his eyes as Raylix took a step towards the transportation-circle. Raylix looked back at his friend, his foot raised to take the next step, through the transportation-circle to Gid.

"Yea, right now." he replied. "I don't think I stuttered, Emka." He then turned around and stepped through the transportation-circle, with Tomosei following him. Sabemka, after a second or two, brought up the rear, with the transportation-circle closing behind him.

The three Devils seamlessly stepped into Hell's capital city, with Sabemka almost being crashed into by a flying Incubus. The streets and sky were both so filled with Devils and Lilim, all making a beeline for Lucifer and Lilith's castle. The centrepiece of Gid, that could be seen from just about anywhere in the city, was twenty-five stories tall, and was (understandably) the absolute most-guarded place in all of Hell, thanks to it technically having two layers of protection (those being Gid itself, which had its own guarding force, and the dedicated guarding force surrounding the castle).

And many, many, MANY Devils and Lilim (Raylix didn't have a snowball's chance of counting them all. There were far too many to count) were making a beeline for the castle, for whatever Lucifer wanted to tell them all. It had to have been some important shit, if it warranted summoning every available Devil, Incubus and Succubus that there was.

"Sir!" Raylix heard a different male voice calling out, and turned around to see the thousand-or-so soldiers within the battalion that he had been leading for nearly two decades all approaching him. A mixture of Devils, Incubi and Succubi, some had served under Raylix for longer than others, but after so many battles together, they all trusted their commander and his two co-commanders absolutely. All thousand-or-so Devils and Lilim saluted Raylix as he, Sabemka and Tomosei rose up to meet them.

"Hey, all." Raylix greeted the group at large. "Before you ask," he continued, raising his voice both naturally and with magic. "I don't know what we're being called here for, so don't bother asking me. I'm sure we'll be eventually told, though."

"Yes, sir!" all thousand-or-so soldiers replied, in unison. Raylix, Sabemka and Tomosei rose up, above most of the sea of Devils and Lilim that swarmed throughout Gid, with the others of their battalion following dutifully behind them.

"This is a weird first trip to Gid." Tomosei remarked, looking down at everyone from where she floated on her four wings. "Is it usually this crowded?"

"Not as far as I know, no." Raylix replied. "I haven't been here either, not since I was really little. I was also born here, but I don't remember that."

"Yea, no shit." Tomosei retorted, rolling her eyes slightly as she looked down on the castle and its grounds. "But still, damn."

A silence suddenly fell over every being, Devil or Lilim, in the area as the doors to Lucifer and Lilith's castle opened. A couple of seconds later, enormous magical projections of the castle's two owners appeared above the castle, so no matter where among the crowd any Devil, Incubus or Succubus stood or floated, they could clearly see their almighty King and Queen.

Lucifer, the First Devil, looked to be a middle-aged man. If one were to judge his physical appearance by human standards, it wouldn't be inaccurate to judge that he was in his late-thirties, potentially early-forties. He possessed chin-length silver hair, dark hazel eyes that bored through everything that he looked at, and light stubble on his face. He also had several faded scars over his head and face, with the most outstanding one being a deep-looking long wound that came literal millimetres away from his left eye. Lucifer was also dressed in ornate white and silver armour, from head-to-foot, with a dark silver cape on his back. His already-regal appearance was completed by the FOURTEEN Devil wings spread from his back, a league of power that no Devil, sans Lucifer himself, had ever achieved.

Lilith, the First Succubus and Lucifer's wife, was a woman of... damn near incomprehensible beauty, in Raylix's eyes. Looking around the same age as Lucifer, she possessed sleek hair, as black as everlasting darkness, that travelled down to back-length like a cascading ebony waterfall. She also possessed bangs that ran along either side of her perfectly unblemished and pale face, with the left bang partially covering her left eye. It, as well as Lilith's other eye, was a deep dark red, deeper and darker than even the crimson hair that most Devils from Gremory's bloodline possessed. Lilith was clad in a long dress that went down to her feet: it was jet-black in colour, further contrasting with her pale skin, and parts of it looked to be straining to keep her hips and bust contained. Her bust in particular, with her chest being the stuff of LEGEND among Devils and Lilim alike for being the largest in the Underworld, and potentially the largest out of any female being in any of the many supernatural worlds. Six heart-ended tails protruded from Lilith's lower back, indicating that her power was in the same league as twelve-winged Devils, Fallen Angels and Angels.

Overall, it was safe to say that Lilith WHOLLY lived up to her (apparently self-proclaimed) title as the most beautiful woman there was, as far as Raylix was concerned.

Raylix could feel his face warming up significantly, the more he looked at Lilith. Something that Tomosei was the first to notice, prompting a short giggle out of his female co-commander.

"Awww~" she cooed. "Raylix has a crush on the Queen of Hell~"

"Sh-shut up!" Raylix stammered, in a very poor attempt at denying Tomosei's teasing. "I don't!"

Sabemka just let out a short chuckle, while Tomosei simply smirked. They, along with every Devil, Incubus or Succubus in the area, fell silent, however, when Lucifer (as well as the large magical projection of him) raised a sand, non-verbally calling for silence among his subjects. It took about half a minute for the absolute silence that the King of the Devils seemingly wanted came, at which point...

"Many of you are surely wondering why you have been summoned here on this day..." he began. "I am obviously aware of the celebratory atmosphere that currently runs throughout this realm, as well as the reasons for it. For those... not aware," he continued, the slightest of sneers appearing on his face as he gazed down upon the Devils and Lilim stood before him. "The crows and ravens that invaded our realm so long ago... have chosen to completely withdraw from the ongoing war."

A couple of dozen meters or so below Raylix's location, and a few hundred meters closer to Lucifer and Lilith, a group of male Devils burst out into cheers, either out of jubilation at the good news or sheer patriotic fervour. Whatever their reason was for interrupting him, Lucifer raised one hand and fired several bolts of pure darkness at the offending Devils without missing a beat. The bolts of energy that he fired out were those of the Primordial Power of Darkness: the power that Lucifer and his bloodline were born with, said to be the original darkness that existed before everything, even the concept of time. As such, it was an extraordinarily powerful ability, probably the most powerful out of any of the unique demonic powers.

The bolts of darkness that Lucifer fired struck the Devils that interrupted him, with the Devils in question having no time to process what had happened to them before they were simply... erased. One second, they were there amongst the crowd, cheering at the words of their progenitor, King, and the closest thing that Devils really had to any kind of God-figure. The next, they were gone, simply removed from existence by that very same progenitor.

"We no longer fight this war against two separate enemies," Lucifer continued, his voice carrying the exact same tone as before, as if he HADN'T just erased a few of his own kind from existence with millions of witnesses, in broad daylight. "But against a single force: Heaven, the Angels, Yahweh, whatever creatures that they create to stand against us. The news that I just passed onto you all will doubtlessly have reached them as well, potentially faster than it reached us."

The absolute silence that Lucifer desired was preserved this time. Everyone had gotten the message from the last time that someone had interrupted the First Devil: that if someone interrupted him while he spoke, it would be the last thing that they ever did.

"This hardly means, however," Lucifer resumed, his voice beginning to rise in volume. "That Heaven and the Angels will slow down in their attempts to destroy us, no. In fact, they will further their efforts to wipe us from the world in their advantage, of this I am absolutely certain!"

Lucifer's voice, already magically amplified, now practically rang in Raylix's ears as he kept going, working himself further and further up. In spite of their silence, the crowd also felt themselves getting worked up by their King's words.

"And that is why-" Lucifer was close to shouting at this point. "Instead of waiting for the Angels to strike first, as we have done so many times, we will be the ones that strike first! We will take the fight to them, in their home realm! AND YOU WILL JOIN ME, MY FELLOW HELLSPAWN-" Lucifer really WAS shouting, at this point. "IN WIPING THE ANGELIC SCUM FROM THIS WORLD, FROM ALL WORLDS, AS WE HAVE BEEN DOING SINCE THE ONSET OF THIS WAR!"

Lucifer turned around, and the metaphorical dam broke. Gid erupted in a cacophony of roars, cheers and screams among the Devils and Lilim: some in praise of their progenitor, others out of a wish for Angelic blood, and other just being general battle-cries. Even though he didn't show it through any roars, cheers or screams like many, MANY other Devils or Lilim (including Sabemka, as a matter of fact), Raylix felt himself taken in by Lucifer's speech. Even he was wrapped up in the desire shared by literally every Devil, Incubus or Succubus for miles around: to wreck Heaven and kill as many Angels as they could.

Lucifer raised his hand before swinging it in a wide arc in front of him, opening dozens of dark portals similar to the Angelic portal that Raylix remembered fighting in the battle to close nearly two decades ago. Through the dark portals that Lucifer had just opened, Raylix could see what he presumed to be Heaven, home of the Angels and of Yahweh, also known as the God of the Christian Bible.

The young Devil's heart began to race as he pulled out his trusty sword-hilt, turning it on and projecting a blade of the Power of Destruction, in preparation for the battle to come. All survivors of this battle, as well as future generations, would remember it as the First Battle of Heaven, the biggest battle of the Great War.

"CHAAAAAAAAAARGE!" Lucifer practically screamed to all his subjects behind him. Said subjects obeyed their King's command and rushed forward, either on foot or through the air, towards the portals that would take them to their next battle. Raylix, Sabemka, Tomosei and their battalion of Devils and Lilim found themselves flying through one of the top-left portals, leaving Hell and entering Heaven.

The first thing that Raylix saw as he went through the portal were the famous pearly gates of Heaven, guarded by a few dozen Angels, who ranged from four-winged to eight-winged in terms of power. At the sight of such an overwhelming number of Devils and Lilim approaching them out of dozens of dark portals, none of them could be blamed in the slightest for freezing up in shock and fear. That didn't stop the Devils and Lilim approaching them from opening fire, both on the Angels and on the gates that served as Heaven's only real protection from invasion. Raylix was one of the lucky few among the enormous force that was able to kill one of the guarding Angels, with the projected blade of his mother's power.

The gates were smashed through immediately, by a combination of blasts of demonic energy and Devils/Lilim bodily flying/running into it, with Raylix being one of the first Devils to enter the absolutely vast space that those affiliated with the realm dubbed 'First Heaven'. It (like the rest of Heaven, Raylix presumed) was bright: far brighter than the Underworld and its dark purple sky, almost dazzlingly so. Aside from the brightness, First Heaven looked like a city of sorts, with there being many tall building-like structures and streets below, with the ground and air practically crawling with Angels. However, it was easy to note that there weren't nearly as many Angels as there were Devils and Lilim storming into their realm.

The Angels who were quicker on the uptake than their white-winged brethren took up arms almost instantly upon seeing Devils and Lilim trespassing on their home: readying weapons of light of all kinds before engaging the invading Devils/Lilim. The Devils/Lilim, quite obviously, returned fire, truly beginning the battle for real.

Raylix had to roll over in mid-air as he flew in order to dodge a particularly large light-spear thrown by a six-winged male Angel. The beginnings of a scream of pain, which quickly faded away, told him that the spear had made its mark and killed one of his fellow hellspawn without him even needing to look behind himself to check... not that he'd have even been able to identify which Devil or Lilim, among a potential million others, was now gone from this world. Switching out his Power of Destruction-blade for a blade of the element of darkness, Raylix flew at the offending Angel and slashed at his stomach, carving a deep gash into said stomach and eliciting a scream of agony from the Angel in question.

The Angel clutched at his gashed stomach with one hand while giving Raylix a look of mixed pain and anger, summoning a light-spear to stab him to death from close-range, but a magical bolt of lightning streaked past Raylix and struck the Angel. It was enough to fry the Angel as well as the robes he wore, causing him to drop like a stone, as dead as he was naked.

"Got your back, Raylix!" Tomosei called, raising a barrier to briefly defend herself and Raylix from a volley of light-spears, thrown by a particularly pissed off-looking female Angel. The next light-spear that she threw ended up cracking the barrier that Tomosei had formed a few seconds ago, at which she flew forward, a manic grin on her face at the thought of dispensing Holy justice on the Devil who'd killed her... brother? Son? Husband? Father? Who knew?

Regardless, as Raylix noticed the pissed-off female Angel before Tomosei, he acted first. His eyes glowed an intense crimson red for half a second, before concentrated beams of the Power of Destruction left his eyes, rushing towards the female Angel that flew at him and Tomosei as fast as a bullet. The destructive lasers missed the female Angel at first, but a quick movement of Raylix's head was all that it took to horizontally bisect the female Angel, stopping her in her tracks and causing her to instantly fall... literally, not metaphorically. She dropped like a stone, just like so many flying enemies that Raylix had destroyed over the nearly-two decades that he'd been fighting for, before falling out of sight with blood, guts and viscera dropping out of both halves of what was now her corpse.

"I've got yours, too!" Raylix called out in reply, earning himself a quick thumbs-up from Tomosei before she twisted around in mid-air and used her staff to block a light-sword from another female Angel. In spite of her middling physical prowess, especially in comparison to Raylix and Sabemka, she was able to hold her own in such a clash of strength for long enough to allow Sabemka to come flying over and crush the top half of the sword-wielding Angel's head with his fists.

Sabemka didn't even allow the Angel he'd just killed to drop several hundred feet to the ground below before grabbing her by her robes and using her corpse as a shield against a couple of other Angels that were simultaneously brave and foolish enough to approach the three Devils. Tomosei used the few seconds of relative safety this action brought her to charge up a powerful fire-attack, and point it at the two Angels, who had now decided that they didn't like their fellow daughter of God being used as a meat-shield by the enemy, and summoned light-spears to throw at said enemy. However, at the last second, Tomosei pointed her staff towards Raylix, who had a pair of Amalgamation-holes held open: one empty, one filled with the darkness-element that he was so proficient in controlling.

Raylix easily caught Tomosei's fired fire-attack with the empty Amalgamation-hole, fusing it with the darkness-filled hole in the next instant and unleashing the result in a devastating wave of dark fire that burned the Angels that were about to attack Sabemka. So hot and so devastating were the dark flames that Raylix had formed out of Amalgamation, and let loose on the Angels, that there was literally nothing left of either of them once the flames had fully passed over them.

While Sabemka dropped the female Angel's corpse, not having much of a use for it anymore, Raylix kept his eyes on the area that the two other Angels used to occupy for a couple of seconds, mentally acknowledging how calm he was in the aftermath of such brutal death. He thought back, for an instant, to the uneasy feeling in his stomach that he'd gotten at his first kill, seeing the body of that Fallen Angel dropping lifelessly to the ground, their life snuffed out as quickly as it would take one to snap their fingers. He remembered how he'd paused after his first kill, in addition to that uneasy, unpleasant feeling: how he'd steadily reacted less and less, both inside and out, with each passing kill that he'd racked up throughout the war.

Raylix's inner musings about whether or not that was a good thing were interrupted as a light-spear came millimetres away from his face. He felt the light-spear passing by his face, and shivered at the feeling of pure light so close to his demonic flesh. Growling, he looked up towards the Angel who had thrown the spear in question and refocused his destructive eye-beams in his direction, piercing his chest with the crimson lasers before flicking his head upwards. The lasers travelled through the Angel's head in conjunction with Raylix's head-movements, destroying his head in an exceptionally gory way: blood, bone and bits of brain dropped out of either side of the three pieces of the Angel's head as he dropped, while Raylix flew another hundred feet or so into the air to survey the battle going on.

The ground was absolutely littered with the bodies of Devils, Lilim and Angels, to the point that it wouldn't be inaccurate to call the ground more covered in corpses than not. As their comrades dropped like flies around them, Devils, Lilim and Angels all exchanged attacks, physical and magical, with each other. It was hard to tell from a glance who was suffering larger casualties throughout the battle, but it was easy to tell that the Devils and Lilim were likely not going to be able to come out on top in such a battle, with many Angels arriving to join their fellow children of Yahweh, either through transportation-circles or just appearing out of crosses of light.

"RAYLIX!" Raylix heard Tomosei's voice yelling for him from below, as she and Sabemka flew up to the point that they were on a level with him, followed by the Devil and Lilim soldiers of Raylix's battalion (or rather, those who hadn't been killed yet). "Here you are!"

"What's up?" Raylix asked, performing his destructive eye-beam attack on a couple more Angels that got too close, and turning back to Tomosei as said Angels slowly fell down, unable to keep flying with where Raylix had hit them with his lasers.

"We've been given the order to assist in stopping the reinforcement-Angels from getting into First Heaven!" Sabemka explained, before turning to Tomosei and Raylix. "So, I guess that means we go over there..." he gestured to the general area that the new Angels were arriving from "and kill all the white-winged bastards before they make it here?"

"That about sums it up, yeah." Tomosei replied. "Raylix, on your orders."

"Alright." Raylix replied, adjusting his grip on the sword in his hand before pointing it at the area that the reinforcement-Angels were coming from. "Let's go, all!" he yelled, readying to fly over there himself. "For Hell!"

"FOR HELL!" the hundreds of soldiers of Raylix's battalion shouted in unison, as they all charged towards the area of First Heaven that the Angels were pouring in from, preparing all manner of magical attacks to fire upon any more of them that showed themselves within that area. As light of differing shapes, sizes and power levels rushed by Raylix, with him dodging around, above and under all that came his way, he couldn't stop himself from smirking in satisfaction as he knew the soldiers of his battalion did the same.

Ever since a particularly disastrous failure against the Fallen Angels within Andras' territory, which he, Sabemka, Tomosei and only a couple of demonic soldiers within his company had managed to escape from, Raylix had drilled it into any soldier that came under him that the best tool one could have when it came to not dying in battle was good movement, and thus trained himself and all of his soldiers in advanced flying techniques, to the point that any soldier serving under him could pull any such technique off, on the fly and in the heat of battle.

The fruits of such training were showing now, with Raylix dispelling his Devil wings to drop just underneath a bolt of light aimed at his head, bringing them back half a second later to keep flying forward. As he saw three more light-spears heading his way, one set dead-on course for him, the second looking like it was going to fly over his head and the third looking like it was going to fly under him, he angled his body to lower himself below the first spear, allowed the second spear to fly right over him and held out his hand, using an Amalgamation-hole to catch the third light-spear, the light of which he combined with his Power of Destruction and sent right back at the Angel who had flung it at him in the first place. As the Holy Destruction-beam struck the Angel in the stomach, blowing it out and causing a scream of mixed shock and agony to come from said Angel, Raylix only took a second to imagine how ironic it was that a Holy being was almost killed by their own element before a bolt of magical lightning from one of the Devils in his battalion struck the Angel and finished them off.

"Raylix!" Tomosei called. "Squad of Angels coming at us, from the right!"

"I see them!" Raylix replied, after a quick glance to the right. He twisted himself in mid-air towards the oncoming Angels, and raised his hand. "You all know what to do!" he called to his battalion at large, summoning a large ball of the Power of Destruction and firing it out of his raised hand at the squad of enemies. At the sight of such a power flying their way, which had been made infamous among Angels and Fallen Angels alike by Bael and his descendants, particularly Venelana and Sirzechs, the Angel squad that had been approaching Raylix and his battalion instantly flew out of the way, giving the large ball of Destruction a wide berth as they all readied light-attacks of all kinds, ready to tear Raylix's battalion apart.

However, before they could throw their weapons of light towards Raylix and his battalion, half of the soldiers of said battalion, led by Sabemka, flew forward at speed. Protected by a layered magical shield cast by Raylix and Tomosei, the company within Raylix's battalion that Sabemka was now leading charged right into the group of Angels, outright killing a few Angels amongst the squad from the sheer speed and force and forcing the others to scatter. As the other Angels scattered, the other company within Raylix's battalion, led by Tomosei, quickly surrounded the scattering Angels and began pelting them all with magical attacks from all angles, making it so difficult to escape from them that none did... sans one.

One heavily-injured eight-winged female Angel had survived both the charge and bombardment, but she was only able to think about her newfound freedom and what she would do with it for all of two seconds before Raylix, who had been floating a few meters away, finished her off with a point-blank shot of his Power of Destruction in her face.

"Alright, we're almost there!" Raylix called, as those in his battalion turned around and reformed into similar positions to those that they were in before the squad of Angels had attacked. "Just another hard push, and then- LOOK OUT!"

A barrage of bullets of intense light were flung down out of Heaven's general light, towards Raylix and his battalion. The yell from Raylix, who had noticed the attack coming before everyone else, was enough to alert them to the attack's presence as well. However, even as everyone began flying out of the way of the oncoming barrage, Raylix was certain that he would be losing some of his loyal soldiers, at the very least. But he couldn't focus on that right now: all he could focus on was getting out of the way of the light that quickly approached him, in hopes that he wouldn't end up becoming one of the many, MANY Devils that would fall in the First Battle of Heaven.

Luckily, Raylix managed to get out of the way of the barrage of light-bullets, and looked back at the soldiers of his battalion as they made their attempts to fly out. His eyes widened as he saw many, easily more than half, of his flying soldiers being hit by the light-bullets: once one pierced their skin, it was enough of an understandable distraction that more soon followed, which was enough to end them. Out of the thousand-or-so Devils and Lilim that had been serving under Raylix at the start of the battle, only around 400, if he had to guess, survived the barrage. Luckily, both Sabemka and Tomosei were among those approximately-400.

"Devils, Incubi, Succubi," A powerful-sounding voice from above sounded. "Shocking inversions of our Lord's holy children. Your presence in this realm is an affront against all things great and good."

"Huh?" Raylix looked up, adjusting his grip on his sword again as the Angel who'd addressed them slowly descended... on TEN Angelic wings.

A Seraph, one of the particularly powerful Angels who served as guardians of Yahweh and Asherah's heavenly thrones. There were many Seraphs- 25, as far as Raylix was aware- and if he wasn't wrong, the one in front of him was known as... Selaphiel.

Selaphiel, like most Angels, wore simple white-coloured vestments in the style that you'd expect a priest to be wearing. She had a reasonably voluptuous form, but it had nothing on the bodies of certain female hellspawn like Serafall, Venelana or Hell-forbid, Lilith. Her hair was a light brown and rather curly, with it going down to her shoulders and framing her face, green eyes and all.

"I refer to the fact that all your species originate from us, the Angels, in a way." Selaphiel continued. "The most powerful Angel, God's own right hand, who tore out his blessed light and turned to darkness, birthing the Devils. And, after tempting and corrupting another of God's creations away from redemption, going on to fashion the Lilim with her help. I cannot stand seeing such vile, impure imitations of us, humble servants of our Lord, and for this you must all-"

Selaphiel was forced to pause, mid-monologue and dodge out of the way of a ball of the Power of Destruction was thrown her way, courtesy of Raylix, who had an annoyed look on his face as he switched out the Power of Destruction-blade on his sword for one of the darkness-element again. Getting the hint, all the survivors within Raylix's battalion, Sabemka and Tomosei included, all prepared for battle alongside and behind their leader.

"Well, at least Devils and Lilim don't drone on and on half as much as you do." Raylix replied, raising his free right hand and firing off another blast of demonic energy at Selaphiel, forcing her to dodge out of the way of that as well so she couldn't right herself. "So the vile, impure imitations have got that going for us! OPEN FIRE!"

Selaphiel was forced to throw up a defensive barrier as all the magical attacks fired by Raylix and his battalion-members came at her, pretty much at the same time as each other. The barrier she had hurriedly thrown up began cracking as all the attacks hit it, but it didn't quite break down completely and leave her vulnerable. Annoyed at this, she flew up once all the fired attacks stopped and returned in kind, flinging several powerful light-spears at Raylix and his group, forcing them to scatter into smaller groups in order to avoid getting pierced and killed. After this, she noticed a smaller group of Devils and Lilim that had gone up during the scattering, just as she had done seconds earlier, and a wry smile formed on her face as she outstretched her hand and formed a thin sword out of what looked like white ice.

She swung the ice-sword while hanging in place in the air, sending waves of ice at the group of Devils and Lilim that she had set eyes on, her smile widening as said Devils and Lilim realised, too late, that Selaphiel had targeted them, and attempted to get away from the ice-waves that she had sent their way. Raylix gritted his teeth as every Devil or Lilim within the group that Selaphiel had targeted were cut apart by the icy waves, their wounds freezing up instantly as they dropped through the air like stones... so at least their deaths were less bloody and gory than having their heads blown up by the Power of Destruction, for instance.

Selaphiel aimed her free hand towards another group that had gone in a similar direction to the first one she'd killed, and fired an orb of ice out of it. Tomosei, seeing this coming, fired a charged shot of demonic energy out of her staff at the ice-orb in an attempt to destroy it. Her aim was dead-on, and her shot of energy hit the ice-orb, though the ice-orb exploded into many ice-shards upon doing so. Ice-shards that flew in every direction like little icy bullets, many of which ended up travelling in the direction of Tomosei's own fellow soldiers. Almost all of the ones that were in harm's way ended up being protected by a barrier that Raylix threw up at the last second, and the shards that flew in Selaphiel's direction (fewer than the number that flew in Raylix and what was left of his battalion's direction) were stopped by a barrier that Selaphiel herself formed.

"Really? Attacking your own allies, Devil?" Selaphiel asked in a somewhat mocking tone, her expression a sneer as she looked down at Tomosei. "And I thought even Devils were above that kind of-"

"Shut up, bitch!" Raylix and Sabemka shouted, in unison, by way of reply, both getting the exact same idea at the exact same time and flying towards her, Raylix winding up for a kick and Sabemka for a punch. Sabemka got to the Seraph first, flying over the swing of her ice-sword and sinking his fist into her stomach. The punch itself didn't hurt her all that much, in spite of how big and burly Sabemka was, but the shock of actually getting physically punched in the stomach by a Devil was enough of a shock to Selaphiel that she didn't notice Raylix also coming at her, leg outstretched, until it was too late for her to make any real attempt to stop him from swinging his leg at her head, sending it snapping to the side as Raylix went flying past, did a fast loop-the-loop through the air and came back for another kick to her stomach, in around the same area that Sabemka had punched her earlier, while Sabemka himself circled around Selaphiel and threw a punch at her head.

Both attacks made their respective marks, and as Selaphiel flew backwards from the force of Raylix's kick, he couldn't hold back a smirk of satisfaction as he heard Selaphiel groaning in pain, and holding the area of her head that he'd clocked with his kick. Letting out a hiss of mixed pain and anger, Selaphiel prepared to summon more Angelic light to her side in an attempt to kill the hellspawn in front of her, but she was again interrupted by a bolt of magical lightning hitting her, causing her to shriek in shock and pain again for a couple of seconds before she was able to dispel the magical lightning, fired by Tomosei.

"Thanks, guys." the female Devils remarked to both Raylix and Sabemka, without a hint of her usual dryness or sarcasm.

"Anytime, Tomo." Raylix replied, smiling for a second as he turned back to Selaphiel, who thanks to Tomosei's most recent attack, seemed to have found herself in a rather... unorthodox situation: though she had come away from the lightning-based assault, courtesy of Tomosei, relatively unscathed, the clothes she had been wearing at the time... hadn't. It took one of the five female Seraph a couple of seconds to realise that she was essentially floating partially-exposed in front of her enemy... an enemy that were known for their less-than-virtuous natures.

Selaphiel let out a scream of indignant rage, covering her left breast (which had been exposed as a result of the vestments she wore being burned by Tomosei's lightning attack) as well as the area around her crotch, which was also partially exposed.

"D-do not look at me like that, any of y-you!" Selaphiel yelled out, her pale face turning a deep red from the embarrassment of being exposed in the middle of battle. "O-only the man who takes me as his wife is allowed to look at what is under my clothes! And you!" she added, looking over at Tomosei. "Y-you should be ashamed of using such a tactic against a higher being! Out of all of your fellow hellspawn that I have destroyed in the past, and those I will destroy in the future, I thought that someone like you would be able to demonstrate something close to respect in conflict with myself! Though the best kind of respect that you could demonstrate would be to willingly allow yourself to be destroyed in the name of advancing the mission of-"

"Again with the GOD. DAMN. MO-NO-LO-GUING?!" Raylix cut across Selaphiel again, flying forward and cutting her off mid-rant with a punch. Five of the last six syllables that Raylix spoke were punctuated with punches to Selaphiel's face and body, with the last one being one that Raylix decided to punctuate with a backhand to the face, infused with the element of darkness. The last backhand drew out a particularly loud shriek of pain from Selaphiel, who summoned a light-sword in her hand and attempted to swing at Raylix, but missed.

With her other hand, she came at Raylix again with the ice-sword she had formed earlier, which Raylix hadn't seen until it was almost too late to stop. However, before the young Gremory could make any attempt to counter the ice-sword, he felt himself pulled back by a magical force cast by Tomosei, who had cast a gravitational magic-circle from her staff in order to pull Raylix away from danger. It had worked, since Raylix was somewhat close to the circle that Tomosei had cast, but it had the side-effect of pulling Selaphiel too: though she hadn't been pulled as far. Either way, Selaphiel clearly didn't figure that she'd get pulled by Tomosei's gravitational spell, and wasn't able to dodge the pelting of magical attacks that were fired at her from all sides by the remaining soldiers of Raylix's battalion, with Raylix himself joining in on the bombardment as well. Though after a couple of seconds, he looked over at Tomosei.

"Hey, Tomo!" He called out to his female friend. "I need the most powerful spell you can charge up, so we can end this monologuing bitch!"

"Way ahead of you!" Tomosei replied, twirling her staff in her hand a couple of times before pointing it at Raylix. A second or two's focus saw her firing a powerful explosion-based attack out of the tip, right at Raylix. The attack would've violently exploded had it hit anything, but thanks to Raylix throwing out an Amalgamation-hole and catching the spell within it, suspending it within the hole, it wouldn't be doing that... not yet, anyway.

Two more Amalgamation-holes appeared around Raylix, one of which he mentally filled with the Power of Destruction, the other he filled with darkness. The three Amalgamation-holes then combined into one, which made its way to Raylix's hand as he focused, amping up the power of the Power of Destruction/darkness/explosive spell combination attack with his own considerable demonic power.

Selaphiel let out another scream of anger as she let out a powerful pulse of light, dissipating all the magical attacks that had been fired at her by the Devils and Lilim. A look of pure rage was on her face as she looked over at Raylix, too consumed by her self-righteous anger to notice the attack he was powering up right in front of her.

"DO NOT TRY TO LECTURE ME ABOUT WHAT I CAN AND CANNOT SAY, DEVIL!" she yelled, at the top of her lungs. "ESPECIALLY NOT WHILE IN MY HOME REALM! I WILL DO AND SAY WHATEVER I..." it was at that moment that she realised the attack that Raylix was charging up, and that her own long-winged monologues had allowed him the vital moments he needed to charge the attack up to this point. "Oh... fu-"

Raylix released the attack after amping it up as far as he could, in a beam of intensely dark energy. Selaphiel didn't even have a chance to let out a dying scream as the Power of Destruction/darkness/explosive spell combination attack blew her apart. Raylix allowed himself three or four seconds of celebration, alongside the surviving soldiers that remained in his battalion, before the blowback of pumping most of his reserves of demonic power into a single attack hit him, and he almost dropped out of the sky from the fatigue that chose that specific moment to hit him.

"Raylix!" Sabemka cried, swooping down and catching Raylix before he could fall any further. "You okay?"

"I'm fine!" Raylix replied, raising himself up out of Sabemka's arms on his eight wings. "Just... fatigued. We need to retreat, and possibly regroup!" he called out to the hundreds of soldiers that were left around him and took orders from him, while looking back the way that everyone had come into Heaven. He saw the portals back to Hell that were still open: even from where he was floating, he could see Devils and Lilim, most likely injured, making their way back through the portals to the safety of their home realm. "Let's go!"

Summoning what remaining strength he had, Raylix flapped his eight wings and made for the portals, with his remaining soldiers following him. They had killed one of the goddamn Seraphim (one of the weaker ones, though), he thought, that was definitely enough to justify withdrawing from the battle.

---

Meanwhile, in a vastly different area of Heaven than the one that Raylix, Sabemka, Tomosei and the rest of what used to be their battalion had just retreated from, a certain incomprehensibly beautiful woman was floating through the air, sex Succubus tails out and barely even reacting to what looked like an entire battalion of six-to-eight-winged Angels, led by another of the ten-winged Seraphim (who Lilith recognised as the one called Khamael), in front of her.

"It's Lucifer's wife!" Khamael shouted to his fellow Angels. "The Queen of Sin! Brothers and sisters, we must destroy the abomination in front of us in the name of our Father! For Heaven!"

"FOR HEAVEN!" the other Angels around Khamael yelled, in unison, and prepared attacks of light to fire upon their single target. Lilith could only raise an eyebrow at Khamael's declaration that she was the 'Queen of Sin'. She'd been called many things, some flattering, some awful, over her long life, but never that before.

...She liked that one.

"NOW!" Khamael screamed, swinging his hand (which he had raised a couple of seconds before) down at Lilith. All approximately-one-thousand Angels sent their attacks, the most powerful attacks that each of them could muster out of their angelic power (opposite of demonic power, but still functioning in the exact same way), directly at the six-tailed Succubus in front of them. As the attacks came closer and closer, Lilith didn't move a muscle: she simply watched everything coming at her with a similar expression on her face to what a regular person would have if they were watching a particularly interesting bird flying overhead.

Khamael was positive that, thanks to the fact that she wasn't moving at all, the abomination known as Lilith would meet her end at his hand. The second being to turn away from the lord's perfect plan for her, and who fell into a life of corruption and sin alongside Lucifer (the first) afterwards. The two of them deserved each other, Khamael thought, and after his victim's death, he was certain that Lucifer would soon follow to join her in the afterlife.

But there was one small problem with the beautiful reality that Khamael had constructed in his head, which became immediately apparent to him when he looked back at Lilith: all the light-attacks that he and his Angels had sent her way... had just stopped in mid-air. A second later, the attacks dissipated, leaving Lilith exactly as clean and perfect as she'd been before the attacks were sent her way. The only thing that looked different about her now was that the expression she carried had a hint of cold annoyance in it.

And that single hint of annoyance was enough for fear- heart-stopping, paralyzing fear- to wash over Khamael's entire body. He felt himself rooted to his spot in the air as Lilith slowly raised herself up, until she was on a level with Khamael, raising one hand as she did so. Even with this simple gesture, the fear that Khamael already felt had ascended to the level of fear that makes you want to throw up (which he very nearly did), as well as give you hallucinations of your own death.

All the other Angels that surrounded Khamael felt the same thing as Lilith continued to raise her hand for a couple of seconds before stopping herself. Pausing for a couple of seconds to take in the hopeless, immobilizing fear that she had struck into the hearts of around a thousand Angels with extremely minimal effort on her part, she slowly and deliberately... closed her fist.

Instantly and simultaneously, all the Angels that had attacked Lilith felt their throats being squeezed by some unseen, extremely powerful force. It took even the dumbest and least resilient Angel among them to realise that the Queen of Sin was the one doing this to them, at the same time.

Khamael was one of the few that was able to struggle against the throat-squeezing during the few seconds that he was able to, even applying some of his Angelic power to the area to try and loosen Lilith's grip on him. But in spite of all the power he bore, as a ten-winged Angel and one of the 24 Seraphim... he was unable to stop his windpipe from being completely crushed. The other Angels met the same fate, killing them all without Lilith even having needed to lay a physical hand on them (though she was certain that at least a few of the Angels amongst the now-dead would have very much liked her to lay a physical hand, or even more, on them). When she was certain that all the Angels in question were dead, she released her grip on them and allowed the approximately-thousand of them to drop to the ground.

Silence reigned over the area after the body of the last Angel hit the ground, with Lilith only taking a couple of seconds to adjust some hairs that fell out of place on her perfect face before a... new presence, made itself known to her. A presence that would make most Devils and Lilim shit themselves with fear upon feeling it as close to themselves as it was to Lilith now.

However, Lilith was not most Devils and Lilim. After all, she'd dealt with the source of this presence- this GODLY presence- firsthand in the past. She also didn't react to the general light of Heaven becoming a little bit brighter, a little bit more intense.

"You know," Lilith remarked, looking right up into the light. "There are better ways to get my attention, you know."

"I'm sure there are." the voice of Yahweh, the Biblical God, came out of the light by way of reply. "But this was the most direct, Lilith. I knew you would react to a thousand of your brothers and sisters confronting you at the same time. Just... not like that."

"Uh huh." Lilith replied, the tone in her voice conveying quite clearly that she didn't believe her creator for a second. She also bristled slightly at Yahweh referring to the Angels she'd just killed as her 'brothers and sisters', but didn't let it show. "Still, pretty cold to sacrifice 1,000 of your own children, just like that." she raised her hand and snapped her fingers just to emphasize the point. "But what were they for you, anyway? A day's work? Two?"

"I'll neither confirm or deny that." Yahweh replied. "But those Angels were surely a lot easier for me to create than what you doubtlessly went through for a similar number of Devils, Incubi and Succubi to be created."

Lilith remained silent, her slight annoyance now replaced by pure, ice-cold anger as she glared up at the light. Yahweh REALLY had to bring that up to her. Now, of all times, in this situation, of all situations.

"What do you want, anyway, Yahweh?" she asked, in a bid to change the subject. "Why did you 'get my attention' in the first place, sacrificing a thousand Angels, including a Seraph, in order to do so?"

"Because those thousand Angels will have been avenged more than a thousandfold, when Heaven emerges as the supreme realm of this divided Pantheon." Yahweh replied, his calm tone betraying a hint of pride and confidence. "But to do that, I need some very specific pieces of information. Pieces of information that I know you have, Lilith."

"And what makes you think I'm just going to hand these hypothetical pieces of information over, Yahweh?" Lilith asked, her face taking on a slight sneer. "If whatever information you're talking about even exists, that is."

"Oh, I think you know." Yahweh replied. "The kind of intelligence, powers and strategy it would take to destroy something quite important to the Devils. Or rather, to destroy someone."

Lilith remained silent, continuing to glare up at her creator. It didn't take a genius to figure out what, or who, he was referring to, and the Queen of Sin couldn't help but consider, Yahweh's offer. Never mind how he somehow knew the true nature of her relationship with the First Devil (Yahweh had an annoying way of always knowing these sorts of things, and it drove Lilith mad. Heaven only knows how the Angels were able to put up with him): after everything that he'd done to her ever since she became what she was now, the idea of him gone was... tempting, to say the very least.

Yahweh seemed to have figured this out, as the intense light around Lilith seemed to soften a bit.

"The fact that you haven't come at me with a sharp retort and/or rejection must mean you find this as attractive from your point of view as it is from mine." Yahweh spoke. "Or, for once, am I wrong?"

…

"No." Lilith spoke, her own glare softening slightly as she looked down at herself. "You're not."

---

1529

It had been ten years since the First Battle of Heaven, and sixty-two years since the Great War of the Christian Pantheon had begun. Since the Fallen Angels had withdrawn from the war, things had only intensified between the Devils/Lilim and Angels, with a Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh and even Eighth direct assault on the Angels' home. In return, there were similarly direct- similarly brutal- on Hell by the Angels, with Devils, Lilim and Angels continuing to fall by the dozens every moment.

Things had gotten especially intense in the most recent years, with many on both sides certain that one side was going to give in some way, one side would break, thereby allowing the other to take everything and claim ultimate victory, ultimate supremacy over the Christian Pantheon. But just when an already boiling war was seemingly about to hit the absolute hottest point... it was all over, with the highest possible glory and the lowest possible tragedy achieved on both sides.

Lucifer, Leviathan, Beelzebub and Asmodeus, the four Devils who had led Hell (or most of it, anyway) from the very beginning, and the four most powerful Devils in existence, had left the Underworld with all the grand fanfare you'd expect out of four night-tyrannical Kings (or more accurately, three Kings and one Queen: Asmodeus) of a species commonly characterised as 'evil'- the truth notwithstanding- for what they had been all too happy to announce was their climactic final battle against Yahweh.

Yahweh, the metaphorical Father and literal Creator of all the Angels that were still alive in Heaven, had left his home realm. Backed by the well-wishes of his creations, the prayers of all those who worshipped Him, as well as his loving wife Asherah, there was no way he could fail in the final battle against Lucifer, Leviathan, Beelzebub and Asmodeus, the four chief reasons that the war, over half a century long, hadn't ended yet. No way whatsoever that he, the sole deity of the world's most-worshipped mythology, could lose against four members of an inferior species, even if said four members were the most powerful of the time!

…

Neither Lucifer, Leviathan, Beelzebub, Asmodeus nor Yahweh returned from their final battle.

With the knowledge that none out of those five beings would ever knowingly surrender to their opponent- especially not in a final battle like the one they had travelled to- only one conclusion could be reached by both sides, without even needing to talk about it: The Four Satans were dead, and so was God.

In the absence of their leaders, all of whom had continued to advance the war, those who had taken leadership of either side had mutually agreed to pull back their forces and, for the first time in a LONG time, cease the fighting between the Angels and the hellspawn.

These occurrences had been the trigger for... mixed reactions, throughout the Underworld. Strong reactions, to be sure, but mixed. On one hand, the top leader of the beings that the Devils and Lilim had been mostly fighting for 52 years, and totally fighting for the last ten, was gone for good. On top of that: the fighting, which for a lot of young Devils and Lilim had been going on for their entire lives, since before some of them were even born, had stopped. There would be no more pointless death on either side, for now at least.

But on the other hand, Lucifer, Leviathan, Beelzebub and Asmodeus were dead too, leaving the Devils and Lilim leaderless, for all intents and purposes. Zekram, son of the deceased Pillar Bael, had stepped up to temporarily lead the Devils until (according to him) more suitable leaders could be found. There were also whispers throughout society of the Lilim, who had always looked to Lilith as a figurehead and potential leader, splitting off from the Devils, but that was all they were so far: whispers, unconfirmed rumours.

In any case, the Devils and Lilim as a whole spent the aftermath of the end of the fighting as a reason to celebrate, while simultaneously mourning the losses of the Satans, who had been looked upon similarly to Gods, at least among the Devils. However, a certain younger son of Zeoticus and Venelana, as well as his two best friends, weren't among the celebrators/mourners: instead, they had opted to spend most of their days at one of the trio's homes.

Today, in particular, Raylix, Sabemka and Tomosei (now 43, 47 and 44, respectively) were at Sabemka's place, enjoying a meal that Sabemka had cooked up for the three of them. Silence was shared between the three Devils as they dug into their Wulf steak.

"So... what now?" Tomosei asked, after swallowing her mouthful.

"What do you mean 'what now'?" Sabemka asked. "The fighting's over. Remember what Zekram said?"

"He said the fighting was over 'for now'." Tomosei corrected him. "It could very well start up again."

"And then again, it could not." Raylix spoke up, after finishing his own mouthful and wiping his mouth. "If either us or the Angels wanted to keep going with the fighting, couldn't Zekram- or whoever's leading the Angels now that Yahweh's gone-"

"Michael, I think it is." Tomosei cut in.

"Yeah, him." Raylix continued. "Couldn't Zekram just order us to go kill some Angels or assault Seville Cathedral or something? Or couldn't Michael order something similar to the Angels that are left?"

"He's got a point, Tomo." Sabemka replied, leaning back in his chair for a couple of seconds before allowing to drop back on its four legs. "If Zekram or Michael haven't ordered an attack by now, a couple of weeks after the Satans and Yahweh are dead, then I'd be surprised if they end up doing so in the future."

"Yeah, I guess you're right." Tomosei replied, stabbing at another bit of steak with her fork. "It doesn't stop me from being conscious of the fact that we could be thrown into another life-threatening battle at a moment's notice. And besides... what were we even fighting for? How did the war even start? WHY did it even start?"

"Beats me." Sabemka replied, leaning back again. This time, he almost leant back too far, and jolted himself back to normal before falling over backwards. "But whatever the reason, at least it's over."

"Yeah." Raylix nodded, stretching as he polished off the last few bits of his meal. "Amazing as always, Emka. How do you make it taste so good?"

"Trade secret, my friend." Sabemka replied, a smile coming to his face from his friend's praise. "Maybe I'll teach you, someday."

"Yeah, that'd be great." Raylix nodded, giving off a grin in return as Sabemka finished off his own (larger) portion of food. "But regardless, Tomosei's got a point. What now, now that the fighting's over? It's not like we knew anything other than the war, considering that we were all born after it started."

"I guess the logical thing to do would be to try and fit back into whatever normal that Devil/Lilim society used to be like before the war started." Tomosei replied, standing up and letting out a deceptively loud yawn, for someone as small (in comparison to Raylix and Sabemka) as her. "Whatever that looked like."

Raylix nodded again.

"Yeah, that does sound reasonable." he remarked. "Or whatever the new normal will be. With Lucifer, Leviathan, Beelzebub and Asmodeus now all- you know- dead, there's no way that things aren't gonna change, at least a little."

"True enough." Tomosei replied. "Though I doubt much will change too quickly."

"Whatever comes, we'll be ready for it." Sabemka spoke, as he began clearing up the plates that he, Raylix and Tomosei had been eating off of. As Raylix and Tomosei both nodded in reply to his remark, a magic-circle appeared by Raylix's ear. Asking his friends to hold on for a minute, Raylix reached up and touched the circle, answering the call.

"Hello?"

"Hello, Raylix." Venelana's voice sounded from the circle into his ear. "I know you're out with your friends right now, and I'm sorry about this, but we need you to come home."

"Okay..." Raylix replied, his eyes flicking over to Sabemka and Tomosei (the latter had headed over to help Sabemka with clearing up after their lunch). "Why? What's up?"

"It's for something... really important." Venelana replied. "I'm sorry I can't tell you this over communications like this, Raylix, but it's one of those things that's better told in person. Zeoticus and I really need you to come home... alone."

"Alright, alright." Raylix replied. "I'm... on my way."

The magic-circle around Raylix's ear dispelled, as Raylix stood up from the table, prompting Sabemka and Tomosei to look over from what they were doing.

"What's up, Raylix?"

"Mother just called." Raylix replied. "Called me back for something really important. She didn't say anything beyond that." he added, at his two friend's raised eyebrows. "Sorry to cut this short, I have to go."

"It's fine." Sabemka replied, shrugging. "At least we got to have lunch, rather than be interrupted by something or other."

"True that." Raylix nodded. "I'll be back as soon as I can." With a final wave to his two friends, he opened a transportation-circle with one hand and stepped through it, disappearing from Sabemka's house and appearing in the kitchen of Zeoticus and Venelana's house, where Zeoticus, Venelana and Sirzechs were all sitting down. They all looked up at Raylix as he entered through his transport-circle, and after seemingly getting the hint, Raylix sat down opposite his father.

"Glad you could make it back so quickly, Raylix." Zeoticus remarked. "Given how important what you're being called up for."

"Mother said that this was really important, yeah." Raylix replied. "So what's up, anyway?"

"Zekram and Lilith have put out a call to all of the most powerful Devils and Lilim in the Underworld." Venelana explained. "Among the four of us sitting here, three of us were selected: Sirzechs, myself, and you."

Raylix blinked, looking over at Zeoticus with a slightly questioning expression on his face. His father just gave a shrug.

"I guess Zekram and Lilith don't want a few dozen thousand Devils or Lilim to serve as cannon fodder against what you'll be going up against." He remarked. "Or rather, Dragon fodder."

"Ahh, right." Raylix replied, nodding. It took him all of a second to fully take in the last four words of what Zeoticus said, causing him to double-take. "Wait... dragon fodder? What the hell, no pun intended, are we going up against?"

"You ever heard of the Heavenly Dragons, Raylix?" Venelana asked. "Ddraig and Albion? Ring a bell?"

"Might've heard those names before." Raylix replied. "What about them?"

"Well, they've gotten into a bit of a battle with each other." Venelana replied. "And it's been causing a good bit of destruction throughout all supernatural worlds and realms. Asgard, Dun Scaith, Takamagahara, Hades, Heaven- you name it, they've been there."

"And if projections from Lilith, Azazel and Michael are accurate, Raylix," Sirzechs continued. "They'll be coming through Hell next. And we, the combined most powerful fighters from the Devils, the Lilim, the Angels and Fallen Angels, are going to bring them down."

Raylix sweat-dropped, and swallowed at the thought. He didn't exactly need for it to be said to know how powerful Ddraig and Albion had to be, if it would take the most powerful of the Devils, Lilim, Angels and Fallen Angels working together to bring them all down. Both of them had to be as powerful as the now-dead Satans, at the very least.

"And... I guess this is happening now?" he asked. "If you called me back here now, it's got to be happening at least soon."

"It is." Venelana replied. "Sirzechs, you and I'll leave for Gid soon, where we'll be being briefed on the strategy needed to bring down Ddraig and Albion."

"R-right." Raylix nodded, feeling a shiver running through his whole body as Venelana answered. Zeoticus summoned a glass of water with a lazy wave of his hand and handed it over, which Raylix was all too happy to down in one go.

A few minutes later, Venelana, Sirzechs and Raylix headed through another transportation-circle to Gid, and gathered in the city square alongside many powerful Devils and Lilim. Raylix found himself reminded of the crowd that had gathered outside of Lucifer's castle for the First Battle of Heaven, ten years ago, but said nothing as the crowd continued to get larger and larger, with the income of more Devils and Lilim stopping at around 2,000.

On a stage that had been erected in the city square that everyone had gathered in, Lilith stepped up, with Zekram coming behind her. Lilith stepped off to the side, however, as Zekram spoke.

"Everyone's attention, please?" he called everyone to attention, with it taking a couple of seconds for all the powerful Devils and Lilim gathered in front of him to quieten down. "Thank you. Now, you've all heard the news of what we're doing, so I won't take up too much of your time with pointless explaining. Ddraig and Albion, according to Michael, Azazel and Lilith-" he inclined his head over at Lilith, who didn't react. "Will be coming through a section of the Underworld around the border between our section and the Fallen Angels' section. The first part of the plan that Lilith, Michael and Azazel have come up with-" he raised his voice as quiet chattering began among the Devils and Lilim in his audience. "Is to contain and keep them there. Out of you gathered here right now, and out of some of the Fallen Angels and Angels that Azazel and Michael have called up for this task, some will remain around the battlefield to hold up a barrier that will keep them contained in the area of Hell that we want them contained in. Any questions so far?"

"Why are we working with those Angelic bastards?!" a male voice spoke up from the crowd. He wasn't stood far from Raylix's location, considering how clearly he could hear him, but he couldn't be seen. "How do we know they're not going to turn on us and wipe us out, along with Ddraig and Albion?!"

"Because Azazel and Michael know full-well that Ddraig and Albion are more of a threat to them than we are currently to them, and vice versa." Lilith spoke up. Her voice was calm, but carried absolute authority in every syllable that came out of her mouth. There was also a hint of sultriness to it, which Raylix almost instantly picked up on. He felt a hardness beginning to form down in his pants just from the twenty-six words that she spoke.

"It will take the full co-operation of all parties involved, if we're going to bring down the Heavenly Dragons." Lilith continued. "Once we've won, we might be able to work from that common ground towards formally ending the war. So that there will truly be no more pointless fighting."

There was silence for a moment or two after Lilith finished her little spiel, after which Zekram swallowed.

"Thank you, Lilith." he spoke. "Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, the plan. Just told you the first part- the second part is the main part of the plan: that involves the most powerful of those gathered here, as well as the Fallen Angels and Angels, doing the bulk of the facing-off against the Heavenly Dragons. Out of everyone gathered here today, we've chosen several of the most powerful of you out of those gathered here today, who will be part of the four main teams facing Ddraig and Albion. When I'm done talking, Lilith will separate everyone into the teams that she, Michael and Azazel have carefully come up with."

Lilith idly nodded, as if to confirm Zekram's words, and to allow Zekram to continue talking.

"And now, for the third part of the plan." Zekram continued, from Lilith's nod. "It involves a key part of the plan to bring Ddraig and Albion down: Distraction. While the main four teams- two for each dragon- are doing their absolute best to bring our Dragonic enemies down, ten teams- five for each dragon, will fly around and distract them with lesser attacks, giving the main team the opportunities they need to fight the dragons. Questions?"

Silence.

"Right." Zekram spoke, after a few seconds. "Just sit tight for a second, and I believe Lilith will separate you all into the groups you've been selected for."

"Good luck, both of you." Venelana whispered to Raylix and Sirzechs, as Lilith stepped up. She pulled them into a brief, but tight hug. "Whatever happens out there... please, please, PLEASE stay alive, no matter what."

"I promise, Mother." Sirzechs smiled, hugging Venelana back.

"Uh, same." Raylix added, hugging back as well as Lilith raised her hand, swung it in a slow, wide arc across the entire crowd, paused for a second, then clicked her fingers. In the span of about half a second, Raylix felt himself forcibly pulled through a transportation-circle, and then deposited at a different position within the city square, by several other Devils and Lilim. Raylix also noticed fourteen other groups of Devils and Lilim now gathered in the city square, seemingly rearranged in Lilith's snap. Venelana was in the largest group of Devils and Lilim, while Sirzechs was in one of the four next-largest groups, with Ajuka standing next to him. Serafall and Falbium were in two of the other three of the four next-largest groups.

As Lilith put her hand down, taking a breath, Raylix glanced at the Devils and Lilim within his own group. He recognised everyone in his group by sight, but the only one he knew by name was Ruvella, descendent of the Pillar Devil Phenex, and daughter of Rika and Renzo. As far as Raylix knew, Ruvella was a good bit older than him: nearer to Sirzechs' age of 69 than his own of 43.

Ruvella was an immense beauty in her own right: sleek back-length blonde hair, with a good portion of it done up into a simple ponytail while the rest of it hung free. Dark blue eyes gazing out on the world from behind her bangs, and just-about flawless skin everywhere there was any skin exposed... and there was a good bit exposed, thanks to the white battle-dress that she wore. Just from a glance, Raylix could tell that it was both sexy and practical: a pretty perfect combination, in his eyes.

"Border Team." Lilith pointed one of her tails at the largest group, the one that Venelana was in, jolting Raylix from his Ruvella-focused reverie. "Main Team Albion-1." she pointed to the only group out of the four next-biggest groups that didn't include either Sirzechs, Ajuka, Serafall or Falbium. "Main Team Albion-2." she pointed to the group with Serafall in it. "Distraction Team Albion-1, 2, 3-" she began pointing to the smaller groups, with the third of the smaller groups being the one with that included Raylix himself. "4, 5. Main Team Ddraig-1." she pointed to the group that had Falbium in it. "Main Team Ddraig-2." she pointed to the group with Sirzechs and Ajuka in it. "Distraction Team Ddraig-1, 2, 3, 4, 5." she pointed out the last five smaller groups, before placing a couple of fingers to her ear and opening up a communication-circle. "We'll move out when Azazel and Michael are ready to co-ordinate teleportation."

Raylix let out a couple of breaths to calm himself as silence fell over the area again. Every Devil and Lilim in the city square knew what was coming, and they were ready. All of them either looked continuously or shot side-looks at Lilith, who stood still as a statue, hand to the communication-circle at her ear, waiting. Raylix could feel sweat forming on his forehead and in his hands from the tension that was felt all around the area- so thick that you could cut it with a knife.

"Alright, all!" Lilith called, raising her other hand and waving to all the powerful Devils/Lilim in the area to get their attention (as if her voice wouldn't have already done so). "It's time! Let's go!"

Just like before, Lilith swung her hand in a wide arc over all the groups she had just created, and snapped her fingers, casting many simultaneous transportation-circles that activated at the same time, sending all the fifteen groups away from Gid simultaneously, before casting one for herself and leaving a few seconds later.

Raylix blinked as he came out of the transportation-circle that Lilith had cast on his group, and had to unfurl his Devil wings to keep himself from dropping. Ruvella did the same, as did the other Devils and Lilim within the group that he was a part of, with the Devils of the other groups doing the same. The Lilim floated in mid-air without the use of wings, but they also unfurled their tails- either ending in arrows or hearts- as well.

A couple of seconds later, other transportation-circles opened within and around the groups of Devils/Lilim, with Angels and Fallen Angels floating out of them. Most of the ones that Raylix could see, that now floated among the 'Distraction Teams', featured eight wings- either pure white or jet black- with a vast majority of the Angels and Fallen Angels among the 'Main Teams' featuring ten, or even twelve, wings. Lilith could also be spotted among Main Team Albion-1 (the one that didn't feature either Sirzechs, Ajuka, Serafall or Asmodeus), floating with her six Succubus tails out.

After pulling off the incredibly difficult task of yanking his eyes away from Lilith and her goddamn perfect body, Raylix looked around his own team, and noticed that the Devils/Lilim gave off looks of suspicion towards the Angels and Fallen Angels, with the Angels and Fallen Angels giving just as suspicious looks towards the Devils/Lilim, as well as each other (though to a lesser extent than towards the Devils/Lilim). Raylix couldn't exactly blame them: they'd been directly fighting with each other for over the last half-century, up until a couple of weeks ago. Even at a fraction of a percentage of a Devil's regular lifespan, Raylix knew that it was only natural for the Angels to be more suspicious of them and the Lilim than of the Fallen Angels, who they'd been at relative peace with for a decade.

Pulling his eyes away from the group he was with, Raylix cast his eyes around the area that Lilith had just teleported him and the Devils/Lilim of his group to. He could see a destroyed town in the distance, but that was the only sign of demonic civilization that could be seen for miles around. Apart from that single town, all that could be seen was plain countryside. Pretty lucky that THIS would be where Ddraig and Albion would apparently be coming through, he figured. He could only imagine the devastation and destruction a fight with two Dragons, who required the strongest forces of all four Factions of the Christian Pantheon to fight, would bring if it took place near a populated area of the Underworld, like Gid... and the thoughts he came up with weren't exactly pretty.

Raylix was jolted from his thoughts when he heard a faint rumbling sounding throughout the area. Quick glances around to try and see where the rumblings were coming from revealed nothing out of the ordinary. The mysterious rumblings grew louder and louder, causing Raylix to sweat a bit more as he glanced around again, a little more nervously and quickly. He summoned a ball of his Power of Destruction into one hand, in preparation for anything that was coming, at around the same time as everyone else began preparing attacks of their own.

"Here they come..." one of the Fallen Angels in one of the groups slightly across from Raylix whispered, audibly gulping as they did so. Raylix swallowed, but tried to calm his nerves in the few seconds of silence that passed before what came next... a huge portal opening in the middle of all the groups, and two large Dragons rushing out, one after the other.

The first one to come out of the portal was an enormous Western Dragon, with a body that was white just about everywhere on them. In fact, the only parts of their body that WEREN'T white were their eyes (which were blue, but currently rather bloodshot) and their horns (which were a brilliant gold, contrasting well with their white body). Unlike literally every other Dragon that Raylix had ever seen, including the second one to come out of the portal, this Dragon possessed feathered wings.

The second Dragon to come out of the portal was, like the first, a Western Dragon: just as enormous as the first, too. Very much unlike the first Dragon, however, this one was mostly coloured red. His lower body was a slightly lighter red than the main part of his body, but it was just as vibrant as the rest of him. He possessed a longer neck than the white Dragon, as well as eyes of a soul-piercing green. There were also red and gold spikes protruding from all over his body (mainly his head, back and upper legs).

"So, uh..." Raylix spoke, looking quickly between the red and white dragons, who instantly turned on each other and began clawing at each other as soon as they came out of the portal. "Which one are we fighting? Which one's Ddraig, and which one's Albion?"

"The white one's Albion!" Ruvella replied, readying a large ball of fire, the heat of which Raylix could feel from where he was floating. He also noticed the two teams that would do the brunt of the fighting against Albion beginning to move in against him, while dense barriers formed and fell around the extended area, presumably cast by the barrier team that Venelana was a part of.

"Right." Raylix nodded, readying his Power of Destruction, and noticing the Fallen Angels and Angels preparing various forms of light to throw/fire at Albion, who seemed to be too busy clawing and biting at Ddraig to even notice the Devils, Lilim, Fallen Angels and Angels around him and his arch-rival. The team led by Lilith paused in mid-air for a second, before Lilith let out a yell of "FIRE!" that Raylix could hear from where he was floating, which prompted everyone who was flying with Lilith to fire their most powerful attacks at Albion, all at the same time.

Albion was blown backwards a bit by all the attacks that had slammed into his side all at the same time, seemingly taken off-guard by the sudden assault. The only reason Ddraig didn't take the opportunity to pounce on his now-distracted rival as said rival looked at the source of the assault he'd just taken was that he'd been hit by a similar assault just seconds before, by the group featuring Sirzechs and Ajuka. From where he was floating, Raylix could see the red and black flash of his older brother's Power of Destruction as it travelled at speed towards the red Dragon.

"Focus, Raylix!" Ruvella called out, flinging a large fireball at Albion's back in conjunction with the other beings who aimed various attacks at Albion's back, in a bid to draw his attention away from Lilith, her team, and the other main Albion team. As he joined in, throwing two powerful condensed balls of the Power of Destruction at Albion, around the same time as Ruvella's thrown fireball exploded on Albion's back, Raylix spotted a Fallen Angel at the centre of the other main Albion team, who he recognised (through descriptions of the man, mainly from Sirzechs) as Azazel, the Governer-General of all Fallen Angels. Black hair, golden bangs, goatee, twelve jet-black wings, black and silver battle-suit, two-pronged light-spear in one hand and a futuristic-looking weapon of some description that shot powerful blasts of light at Albion's head, it was him.

Albion let out a roar of surprise and anger as he realised that he was actually being challenged and attacked by beings that, in his mind, were no more than ants in comparison to him, a proud Heavenly Dragon with power beyond all of his kind (sans two certain... irregularities, among their species). Raising one of his large claws, he swung at one of the groups of ants, but they annoyingly scattered out of the way just when his claw was about to sink into their ant-flesh. Every member of the group that he'd just swiped at returned fire upon him, and he was forced to let out a growl of slight pain as he felt the powerful attacks, each of which would've likely been powerful enough to wipe out an eight-winged Devil/Angel/Fallen Angel, or a four-tailed Incubus/Succubus, striking his pure-white scales.

Ddraig wasn't faring much better against the teams of ants that had bravely, but foolishly, challenged him, and now swarmed around his enormous form. His emerald-green eyes focused on one team in particular, that had attempted to distract him with their pitiful excuses of attacks, he took in a short breath and blew out a powerful, concentrated burst of fire that reduced every ant in that specific team to ashes. Apart from said ashes, which now lightly fell to the ground, there weren't any signs that that team of ants were even there at all.

He leapt forward at another team of particularly powerful ants (there wasn't anyone there who had any less than five tails/pairs of wings) and chomped at them with his jaws, in an attempt to either trap them in his mouth or crush them between his teeth, the longest of which were as long as the average man was tall. Just as annoyingly as the team of ants that Albion had swung at earlier, the ants that Ddraig chomped at scattered out of his way, and returned in kind with their powerful shots of demonic/angelic energy. A shot of black and dark red demonic energy hit Ddraig's left eye, blowing it up on contact. The Welsh Dragon let out an ear-splitting roar of pain and anger as he realised that he was now half-blind, and flailed around in all directions in a blind (or half-blind) rage, sending a stream of fire from his mouth as he did so.

The flames engulfed the surrounding area, with many Devils, Angels, Fallen Angels and Lilim either being burned by the blaze or straight-up incinerated, with any ground that Ddraig's flames touched being instantly scorched.

"Watch out!" a Devil who Raylix didn't know the name of shouted, alerting Raylix (who had been aiming several more thrown balls of the Power of Destruction into Albion's open mouth, as the Vanishing Dragon roared at anyone who dared attack him) to a part of the fire that was approaching him and his group. Throwing his last Destruction ball at Albion, Raylix flung up his hands and pooled his energy into a hastily-formed magical barrier that the Devil who had shouted out to him had just formed. Everyone else within the group that they were a part of, including Ruvella, did the same.

However, the flames that struck the barrier were so hot that they seemed to burn through it, in spite of all the power put behind it. As soon as Ruvella realised this she let out a scream of "SHIT!", which was the perfect call for anyone who hadn't already rushed as far away from the oncoming flames as they could to start doing so before they were reduced to ashes, like so many other of their comrades. Raylix was lucky enough to escape the flames, for the most part, with the only part of him suffering any major damage being his hands. The red Dragon's flames were so unbelievably hot that half a second of Raylix's raw Devil hands being exposed to said flames was enough to burn them, to the point that skin and flesh had seemingly melted off of them, revealing the bones underneath.

His hands shaking, Raylix was barely able to focus enough to keep his Devil wings outstretched so he could stay airborne, such was his shock at his hands being burnt literally down to the bone. So shocked was he that he couldn't even scream out in pain, as the (most likely) natural reaction would be.

The only thing that snapped the youngest descendent of Gremory out of his shock was Ruvella (who had escaped from Ddraig's flames completely unscathed... either that or she had suffered damage, but had healed due to her inherited power: Flaming Regeneration) laying a gentle hand on his shoulder. With her other hand, she fumbled around in her battle-dress with the other hand, seemingly looking for something.

"Ah, here they are." she spoke, pulling out two small red and gold-coloured capsules from a pocket within her dress. With her free hand, she took hold of one of Raylix's wrists, flicked open one of the capsules with her thumb and poured out its contents, a sparkling liquid of some description, onto Raylix's burnt left hand. The effect it had was instantaneous: the flesh and skin that had been melted away from Raylix's left hand seemed to quickly unmelt, directly before his eyes. Within a matter of seconds, his left hand was as good as new. Ruvella then silently took Raylix's right wrist in her hand and performed the same with the other capsule, with Raylix's right hand being healed just as quickly as his left. "Are you okay, Raylix?"

"I..." Raylix felt his eyes drawn to one of the only beings in his group (sans him and Ruvella) that had been incinerated by the outburst of flames that Ddraig had spewed out everywhere. Though with how he was reacting to having his entire body seemingly engulfed in such hot fire, he'd probably have been better off instantly killed. Understandably unable to focus on staying airborne, he span over and over as he fell down like a flaming rock, screaming for his loved ones before he landed on the ground with a VERY noticeable and VERY unpleasant-sounding splat, and moved no more.

Raylix had to close his eyes and take a breath after he'd seen that, before opening them and focusing back on Ruvella's face. Her goddamn beautiful face...

"Y-yeah!" he replied, shaking his head a couple of times. "I'm o-okay."

"Good." Ruvella nodded. "Come on, we'll join up with Distraction Team A2, they're just over there." she pointed to a team that had pooled their power together to fire an extraordinarily powerful ball of mixed demonic/angelic energy at Albion. However, Albion seemed to have noticed the attack coming just before it hit him, and he turned to face the team that had fired at him. The mixed demonic/angelic ball of energy struck Albion squarely in the nose, but it did seemingly nothing to the white Dragon. In fact, it seemed to reflect the energy-ball that had just been fired at him right back at the team that had fired it in the first place. None of the members of said team had any time to even try and fly away before they were all annihilated by the ball of energy.

"Or... not." Raylix remarked, as both of the main A-teams bombarded Albion's upper back with many powerful attacks, causing the dragon to let out a scream of pain and focus on them before they scattered again. "How about Distraction A4?"

"Good idea." Ruvella replied, flapping her flaming wings (unique to descendants of Phenex) and flying off at high speed, with Raylix barely able to keep up with her as they reached the distraction team that they were flying towards, who allowed them in without question. However, it turned out that their role in distracting the white Dragon had become less needed, as the two main teams dedicated to fighting Albion seemed to have moved in and continued to lay on the attack, with Albion beginning to suffer some pretty major-looking injuries as a result of the constant bombardment. Many of his once-pristine white scales were cracked, blood oozed from his mouth, his eyes were bloodshot, and he seemed to move around far more gingerly than at the start of the fight.

He could see several enormous spikes of ice being conjured from thin air and flung at Albion's feet, where they struck and impaled the injured Dragon, holding him down and rendering him unable to move without letting out screams of pure agony, seemingly enough to dissuade him from moving.

'Serafall's work, most likely.' Raylix thought to himself, but the sight of Lilith flying up towards Albion, raising her leg (what Raylix wouldn't have given to be closer to the Queen of Sin so he could see Lilith's perfect legs better) and AXE-KICKING Albion right in the face with so much power that it sent him down to the ground with such a powerful shockwave that the ground seemed to shake only made Raylix's eyes widen even further.

After Lilith's axe-kick, Albion could only weakly raise his head up as Lilith landed lightly on the ground, still as perfectly clean-looking as she'd been at the start of the fight. Meeting Albion's gaze unflinchingly and unblinkingly, Lilith raised up one hand and formed a spear of pure, concentrated Primordial Darkness in it, before throwing it at Albion's exposed chest. The spear of darkness flew right through Albion's chest like it wasn't even there, with the white Dragon not even having the strength to even scream out in pain again as he flopped down, unable to even move anymore.

He could barely believe that he, a proud Heavenly Dragon, had been reduced to this by ants, but he didn't have time to dwell on it any longer as Lilith calmly walked up to his downed and wrecked form, rested a hand on his giant face, and sent a pulse of Primordial Darkness throughout his entire body. Albion seemingly froze before his body... scattered away, on the wind. His entire body was gone within ten seconds, leaving nothing behind.

"HA! H-HA!" Ddraig's booming voice echoed across the battlefield, with everyone who had been focused on Albion looking up to see the Red Dragon, a toothy grin on his bloodied and partly-destroyed face. "YOU WERE THE FIRST TO FALL, ALBION! PROVING THAT I AM, AS I'VE ALWAYS SAID, THE SUPERIOR OF THE HEAVENLY DRAGONS, AND THE STRONGEST DRAGON!"

The rest of Ddraig's body wasn't faring much better than his face. One of his wings was completely gone, his scales seemed to have been even more badly cracked than Albion thanks to the constant assault and abuse to them, and he was limping badly as he walked, glancing around at the remaining gathered forces of the Devils, Lilim, Fallen Angels and Angels. Nobody noticed this, least of all Ddraig, but a golden tint was coming to the Underworld's dark purple sky.

"YOU DESTROYED MY RIVAL" Ddraig continued. "AND I INVITE YOU ALL, BRAVE ANTS, TO COME AND DESTROY ME! I WON'T FALL AS EASILY AS ALBION DID: IN FACT, I'LL TAKE ON ALL OF-"

A pillar of golden light emerged from above, streaking down from the sky and striking Ddraig with pin-point accuracy. The weakened Red Dragon didn't even get a chance to finish his declaration as he was seemingly smitten from above.

Seemingly as soon as it appeared, the pillar of light was gone, leaving most beings utterly confused as to what in the unholy hell had just happened. Their confusion was brushed aside, however, as triumphant cheers began to rise among the surviving teams of Devils, Lilim, Angels and Fallen Angels. For the first time in their respective histories, the four species had worked together for a single, common goal, and it had worked out. They had won.

Even Raylix joined in on the cheers as they ascended higher and higher in volume, such was the jubilation of all parties involved. The cheering went on for about a minute before the barrier that had surrounded the battlefield seemed to dissipate, and Angels and Fallen Angels began to warp away, no doubt not wanting to stay in demonic territory any longer than they absolutely had to.

It was when Devils and Lilim began warping away as well, that Raylix took the hint and left via transportation-circle. Fatigued and sweaty from the new biggest and hardest battle he had ever fought in so far, only one thing could occupy his mind: He needed to sleep. And to wash, but mostly sleep.

Okay, maybe two things.

---

Two weeks had passed since the climactic battle between the combined forces of the Devils, Lilims, Fallen Angels and Angels of the Christian Pantheon, and Ddraig and Albion. Celebrations popped up all over the Underworld, on the Devil/Lilim and Fallen Angel sides of things in particular (as the Heavenly Dragons had been defeated in their realm. Lilith received strong acclaim and more adoration than she already had- for obvious reasons- for being the one to lay the final blows on Albion, but no-one among the Devils, Lilim or Fallen Angels had any idea who had been the one to finish Ddraig), but said celebrations were far quieter than the ones that had raged throughout the Underworld a week before, when the fighting between the Three Factions seemed to finally be truly over.

Some of the survivors of the battle in question didn't join in with the celebrations, but instead took the chance to spend the first couple of weeks of peacetime that they had seen in either their entire lives, or for over sixty years, relaxing and recuperating. Two of the survivors- Sirzechs (who had sustained far less injury than his younger brother during his side of the battle against Ddraig) and Raylix- were among the survivors that took this path, with both brothers situated in the living room of their house. Sirzechs had a book open, and Raylix was using an assortment of tools to take apart the projectable sword-hilt that Sirzechs had gifted him three decades ago.

"What's up with your sword, Raylix?" Sirzechs asked, looking up over the rim of his book at his brother for a couple, when the sight of him taking apart his sword caught him out of the corner of his eye.

"Nothing much." Raylix replied. "I was just wondering how it worked while training this morning, and decided to get a closer look at it. You know, in case something ever went wrong, or if I could improve it." he explained, looking up himself from his partly-taken-apart sword and tools. Sirzechs, still looking over his book, nodded.

"That makes sense, as long as you know what you're doing. Just be careful with it, though, I remember how much that sword cost our parents to get it made for you." he replied. "You know, Ajuka might be able to help you with looking at your sword. He's always been interested in stuff like that, and I'm sure he'd be happy to help."

"Sweet!" Raylix replied, smiling as Sirzechs went back to his book. "That'd be really nice."

Silence fell over the older and younger brother again as Raylix went back to working on the sword, occasionally muttering to himself as he did so.

"So that's how the handle comes apart... oh, so the crystal goes there... and the switch connects to it like that. Huh."

Sirzechs smiled from behind his book as Raylix continued to look closely at the sword that he'd been gifted. He'd seen Raylix use it in battle many times, which already brought him enough pride, but seeing him potentially try to improve on what he'd been given?

That brought a wholly different kind of pride to the older brother, which he liked just as much, debatably even more so.

The relative silence was interrupted by the sound of a transportation-circle opening in the house's kitchen, which both Raylix and Sirzechs could see from where they were sat. Zeoticus and Venelana, who had both left the house before Raylix and Sirzechs had woken up for the day, popped out of the transport-circle as it faded away beneath them.

Venelana quickly greeted her two sons before moving away upstairs, while Zeoticus walked to the living room, stretching before sitting down in one of the free chairs.

"Anything wrong with Mother?" Sirzechs asked, putting his book down as Zeoticus leant back in the chair he had sat down in, letting out a breath.

"No, she's just tired." he replied, rubbing his chin-beard. "Just had one of those nights last night, and we had to get up early this morning for the meeting."

"Oh, so that's why you left early. I was wondering." Sirzechs replied. "Raylix was a bit worried." he added, slightly teasingly.

Raylix just rolled his eyes at Sirzechs, not taking his eyes off the sword that he had now fully taken apart.

"What was the meeting about?" Raylix asked, putting down the thaumatium crystal that had powered his sword for the last (approximately) thirty years and picking up the part of the sword that it had been contained in, and beginning to have a closer look at it.

"A couple of things, actually." Zeoticus replied. "First and most importantly for the two of you, Zekram has formally declared that, until new Satans can be found, he will take control of how the Devils are run, and will be forming a provisional government until then. That was a big part of what the meeting your mother and I went to was about: forming that provisional government."

"Didn't everyone pretty-much already know about Zekram taking over, though?" Raylix asked. "With him being who he is, I figured he was a given. Either him or Lilith, right?"

"Yeah, I thought the same." Sirzechs remarked, before turning back to Zeoticus. "What was the second thing, Father? You mentioning that the whole provisional government stuff was the first thing implies that there's more."

"And you'd be right, Sirzechs." Zeoticus replied. "And I was getting to that. The second thing that was discussed at the meeting is that... Lilith and the Lilim have declared independence from the Devils, and have requested a portion of the Underworld to govern by themselves."

"...O-oh." Sirzechs replied. "I thought they were just rumours, but... I didn't figure something like that would actually happen. At least, not this soon."

"Me neither, to be honest." Zeoticus replied. "Zekram has accepted Lilith's independence-declaration, and has negotiated a portion of the Underworld for her and the Lilim to occupy and govern by themselves. Though I'm not sure that many Devils will be too happy with WHICH portion of the Underworld that the Lilim will now occupy and govern: it includes Gid, our capital. Truth be told, I'm not exactly thrilled about the idea of our capital being given away like that, but..." he sighed. "It is, what it is."

Sirzechs nodded, while Raylix, satisfied with everything that he'd looked into regarding his sword, began the process of putting it back together: thaumatium crystal into its container, container into magical circuit-board, re-establishing the connection between the switch and the board that the container was held on, and fitting everything neatly back between the parts of the shell that made up the sword's handle.

As he worked, he mentally took in everything that his father had just told them, particularly about the Lilim declaring independence from the Devils: while the idea of the capital of Hell falling out of the hands of the Devils certainly SOUNDED bad, he... didn't have much of an opinion on the matter one way or the other. He'd only lived for a fraction of a percentage of a Devil's supposed lifespan of ten thousand years, and out of that he'd only been to Gid a couple of times, so the city didn't hold much sentimental value to him, personally.

He was sure that some Devils, at the very least, would be mad at him for having that kind of perspective, even call him a traitor to his kind, but... whatever.

After putting his sword back together, and turning it on and off again to make sure it fully worked, he attached the sword back to his belt and stood up, feeling slightly peckish. While Sirzechs and Zeoticus continued to talk about who would occupy what positions in the provisional government that Zekram was planning to build, he headed over to the kitchen, mentally considering various simple foods that he could cook for himself.

It was the anniversary of the deaths of Sabemka and Tomosei's parents, and they had decided to go and visit the graves that they had made for them, so Raylix had decided that it wasn't worth calling the former up to work his culinary magic, not today. Definitely not today.

But before Raylix could even reach up to get anything, there was a knock on the front door of the house. Raylix paused, looking over at the door, but Sirzechs had already stood up.

"I got it." he announced to his father and younger brother, walking over to the door and opening it. Though Raylix couldn't see who was standing on the other side from the angle he was standing at, he certainly saw Sirzechs looking at whoever was at the door in slight shock, before coming to and greeting them.

"Z-Zekram, this is a pleasant surprise."

"Zekram?" Raylix and Zeoticus remarked, simultaneously, with Zeoticus standing up and Raylix turning his attention away from the kitchen and back to the door. Sirzechs stepped backwards, allowing the son of the (dead) Pillar Devil Bael, father of Venelana and maternal grandfather of both Raylix and Sirzechs to step into the house. In stark contrast to the casual wear that Zeoticus, Sirzechs and especially Raylix were wearing, Zekram's attire was the kind that wouldn't look out of place on a King.

"Good afternoon, all of you." Zekram greeted the three male Devils. "My apologies for coming without notice, and for coming so soon after the meeting you just returned home from, Zeoticus."

"It's... no trouble, really." Zeoticus replied. "Venelana's upstairs, if you want to see her."

"Hm." Zekram hummed. "Though the matter I've come to discuss doesn't concern her directly, it's important enough that I must ask if you could bring her down here. I'd rather talk about this with all of you." he replied, taking a second to look over at Sirzechs before casting his eyes to one side at Raylix, who blinked instantly from the sudden eye contact.

"Uhh, alright. Sure." he replied. "Just a minute, I'll go get Mother."

"No need, Raylix." All four male Devils heard Venelana's voice coming from the stairs as Raylix's mother came downstairs, yawning after having dressed into a dressing gown. "I heard someone knocking on the door and thought I'd- oh, Father. I'd have kept my dress on if I knew you were coming."

"It's alright, Vene, it's alright." Zekram held up a pacifying hand. "Don't worry about changing, I won't be here long."

Within a minute, the five Devils were sat down in the living room together: Zekram, Sirzechs and Raylix on the three chairs, and Zeoticus and Venelana on the sofa. Some alcoholic drink with a name that Raylix likely didn't have a chance in Hell of pronouncing correctly had been poured for Zekram. Silence reigned over the room as Zekram sipped from his drink, before Venelana (who looked far more awake now than she had done a couple of minutes ago, never mind when she had arrived home with Zeoticus several minutes before) broke it.

"So, Father, what's this important matter that you want to discuss with us? How important is it, for one?"

"Something important enough that I'm planning to speak about it to all surviving descendants of the Pillar Devils." Zekram replied. "Since you are all..." he smiled warmly at everyone sat around him "family, to me, I thought I'd speak with you about it first."

"Must be insanely important, then." Sirzechs replied. "Something that could affect the entire Devils' side of the Underworld, supposedly."

"Ah, so you've been informed about the... split." Zekram nodded. "But, yes. You are correct, Sirzechs, this is a matter that does, or will, involve all Devils. I'll get straight to it: the surviving children of Leviathan, Beelzebub and Asmodeus have expressed opposition to the provisional government that I'm planning to build, and are building up forces to take over the Underworld by force. With goals that likely involve continuing the war that's just stopped after over sixty years."

"What kind of forces?" Venelana asked. "The Extra Demons, I guess?"

"Precisely." Zekram replied.

"Extra Demons?" Raylix spoke up. "I've... never heard of them, sorry."

"They're like the Pillar Devils." Zeoticus explained. "Devils that were recognised for their services to the Underworld and given the specialised powers to signify such. But unlike the Pillars, who were given a portion of the Underworld to govern in place of the Satans, the Extra Demons and their families directly serve the Satans and their families. There are thirteen of them: Lucifer has- or had- four in his direct service, while Leviathan, Beelzebub and Asmodeus had three."

"Correct." Zekram nodded. "The thirteen Extra Demons are Abaddon, Belphegor, Mammon, Lucifuge, Satanchia, Agaliarept, Fleurety, Sargantanas, Nebiros, Pheles, Shaiten, Wechuge and Namtar. All of them were killed during the war, so it's just their descendants now. Anyway, the Lucifuge, Shaiten and Wechuge families formerly served Lucifer and his family, but the only child of Lucifer and Lilith- Rizevim- seems to have disappeared. In spite of that, they, and the forces under their command, have joined up with the armies under the command of Leviathan, Beelzebub and Asmodeus' grandchildren: the Shaitens now work with Tsufaame- Leviathan's daughter-, the Wechuges now work with Bidleid- Beelzebub's son-, and the Lucifuge family now work with Damaidosu- Asmodeus' son-."

"Hang on, I thought there were four Extra Demons that used to serve Lucifer." Raylix spoke up, again.

"There are." Zekram replied, looking over at Raylix again. "However, Mephisto Pheles, the only surviving descendent of Pheles, has voiced the desire to stay out of the other Extra Demons' business, and seems to have vanished from the Underworld altogether."

Raylix nodded, and sat back as Zekram took another sip out of his drink.

"Now Venelana, Zeoticus, assuming that you aren't in support of this new faction of Devils that seems to be gathering forces, I'm inviting you, Sirzechs and Raylix to attend a meeting of the descendants of the remaining thirty-eight Pillar Devils." Zekram continued. "So we can work out how best to counter this, ah, Royal Faction."

"Of course, Father." Venelana replied, with a nod.

"I'm in." Zeoticus added.

"I'm in, too." Sirzechs added, as well.

"Sure." Raylix finished, stretching.

"Wonderful." Zekram inclined his head to the four of them, before finishing the rest of his drink and standing up, after setting the glass on a small table. "When I have the support of all the remaining Pillar descendants, I'll have someone stop by to let you know when and where this meeting will be, and we can move forward from there. Any questions?"

"Did you come up with that 'Royal Faction' name just now?" Raylix piped up, again. "Or was it something that you spent some time thinking about?"

"...No comment." Zekram replied, before casting a transportation-circle underneath himself. "Goodbye."

The transportation-circle rose, and Zekram disappeared into the transportation-circle, vanishing from the room.

---

Ahh, fuck, I broke my record for 'longest chapter I've ever written' again, didn't I?

...Oh well. I didn't quite hit 20k words (not counting this A/N), but eh. Maybe next time.

Anyway, that's the third chapter finally complete! A bit heavy on the time-jumps, I think, and I'm sorry if you didn't like them here. The only thing I can say is that there'll be less of them going forward. I thought it best to skip through the Great War and get to the Devil Civil War and beyond, though I could easily plan/write a whole fic just about the Great War, with Lucifer and Bible God as the main characters.

And I'm not talking about the OA&A-verse here, either, I'm talking something that would easily fit into canon. But that aside, this fic marks the debut of the third version of Lilith that you'll have seen in my fics (first in that piece of shit RWG, second in Nephalem, third here), and she'll be pretty... different, from the other versions of her that you've seen in my other stories, I'll give you that much.

Hope you readers enjoyed this chapter, and you have it in you to leave reviews to tell me your thoughts, or if you want to chat with me (about the fic, DxD in general or something else entirely), drop me a PM or look me up on Discord (name for it is on my profile). Either method works for me!

Three Sizes of New Girls:

Lilith: 128-54-95

Ruvella (yes, she's a genderbent version of Ruval Phenex. Though you could also consider her an OC, since the character she's a genderbend of shows up ONCE in canon): 95-56-86

Seeya!