[ OP: Takanori Nishikawa – Ama-no-Murakumo-no-Tsurugi -SKYBREAKER-]
Demon Realm In Tempest! Great Heroes of Time, Could the Tears of a Devil Reach Your Steeled Hearts!?
"Do you mean to say…"
"... yep."
.
.
.
"Well, you haven't thrown anything at us yet."
Dark shadows cast over the elven demoness's eyes.
"I'll just let you know…" Puddin's white sclera briefly blackened. "If I was gonna make a move, you'd already be gone. Lucky for you, I'm too busy trying to unscrew this shits how for you to be anywhere on my to-do list. So you can cut out the defensive crap, because it's startin'yaa~ piss me off."
Robelu's sharpened fangs grew more and more visible.
"Gonna do it?"
Chamel looked over to his accomplice. "Robelu, are you…!?"
"We shall do," she croaked despondently, "What we must."
Goku subtly tensed, preparing for a battle. Ace, however, stood silent.
"T-... T-t-tr…"
Robelu seemed to have something caught in her throat.
"T-t-tr-tru-... tr-uu~uu…"
Puddin turned to her cohorts and whirred a finger around her temple.
"Truuuu~"
"Truce." Chanel finished his partner's sentence while she went over to convulse. "We propose a truce."
Ace's eyes rolled.
"Haven't we already done this sorta thing?" Goku asked, annoyed.
Robelu whipped her head back up. "THAT'S PRECISELY WHY-" she squealed between her fits of dry heaving.
Puddin stared.
"I've decided…!" Puddin grew somber, with a tinge of conviction, as she squeezed a raised fist. "Joining ourselves in comradery is the only way we can get to the bottom of all this and make it back to Conton City!"
Chamel frowned, confused. "But you haven't even heard our terms-"
Robelu dry heaved harder.
Puddin stared.
"THE TERMS DON'T MATTER!" Puddin bellowed, pure resolve stemming from her impassioned declaration. "It's clear to me what we have to do…! WE HAVE TO SAVE THE DEMON WORLD 'CUS ITS POOR DEFENSELESS CITIZENS what a shocker CAN'T DO IT THEMSELVES!"
Robelu began beating on the ground amidst her fruitless retching.
"I'm startin'a think this ain't from the good of her heart..." Goku said to himself, vocalizing Ace's thoughts as the latter pinched his temple.
Puddin performed her coup de grace. "HERE!" she exclaimed with glossy eyes, her hand reaching out to the demonic secretary in dire suffering. "TAKE MY HAND, ROBELU! TAKE THIS HAND BELONGING TO I, DEMON GOD PRINCESS PUDDIN, AND JOIN ME, DEMON GOD PRINCESS PUDDIN, IN THIS EXCITING ADVENTURE OF FRIENDSHIP AND TEAMWORK AND LOVE AND-"
Robelu stopped dry heaving.
Puddin sighed, satisfied, as the others watched in horror. "Alright, I'm happy. Let's talk n' move."
[ BGM: Reichi Nakaido – Lain's Theme ]
"Of course." Chamel had broken into sweats. "(Intentional or not… good move, Robelu.)"
"THREE Demon Realms!?" Goku reiterated, in flight with the rest.
Chamel nodded. "You're well aware of one — the 'Dark Demon Realm' as you lot call it, and where we are now. But there is also the placid 'Mystic Demon Realm' and ITS three worlds. Its residents harbor traits that most of you mortals would find more 'agreeable'."
Robelu seemed to feel Ace's inquisitive look. He was the only one interested in more talking, so he had to have something.
"Long ago, further back than even your beloved Chronoa could hope to fathom, there was only one realm: an entropic 'concept' with no means of true definition, not even 'chaos'. It possessed no certainties, and once it did, it altered them on a whim, only to hold them for eons at a time, only to reverse it all and return to nothingness, and so on and so forth. However, it was because of this lack of certainty that the first, the Supreme Demon King, could take form. Though eons it took, He was able to gradually become aware and, some time after, hold onto Her consciousness through Their many forms."
"Non-binary superstar, yeah~!"
Robelu glanced back, brow cocked. "What?"
Puddin whistled innocently.
As the midnight blue-haired demon rolled her eyes, Chamel took over. "Yes, though we consider Him one supreme king, in truth, She was in fact two; one held, we'll say, 'wicked' traits, one held 'virtuous'. And in that storm of consciousness, the two great demon gods played a game of roshambo. The winner would mold the realm in their image. It was supposedly a best-of-three match…"
"Rosham-mmh..." Puddin began to mentally check out.
"But the bout lasted for what mortals call 'eons'." Robelu carried on. "In that time, they were undone, and then reformed, by the incessant chaos of the 'Lowest' World, each one retaining even more of their identity as they eventually returned to that game. A constant – the first in history – was forged from the eternal tie. In time, forging a perpetual awareness from their game, the two's patience wore thin and, deciding to hurl their clenched fists at each other, battled. That fight helped split the Demon Realm, establishing an 'order' in two corners."
"Oh," said Goku.
"You don't need to pretend to listen," an ever-so-slightly irked Robelu replied, prompting a bashful laugh. "Both used the time to cool their heads, and further stabilized these two corners with their power, molding them in the image they saw fit. One wanted a lively, just realm where beings lived in a constant, connected state; the other wanted a hostile world whose beings had to force others under their own individualistic wills to thrive. But what they found was that the chaos of the third world still lingered throughout the corners in ways — from one's purest vessels sprouted indescribable evils exceeding the worst of the Second, and through the other's battle-hardened devils appeared ideas of virtue surpassing the best of the First."
"Thus, after calming down a few eons later, they reunited, and discussed what they'd learned. The lessons shared by the two led to the formation of both worlds. The 'evils' and 'virtues' of the two were divided across each other, and as individual wills saw form in the First, as did the Second see harmonies. With time, the Supreme's two halves formed identities of their own; a king for the First and Second realms, respectively. Every step afterward further built upon the virtues of both realms, until hierarchies were built, worlds were separated, and the Demon Realm took shape."
"Wait," Goku interjected, "How'd they figure out which realm's which, anyway?"
"Roshambo."
"Oh."
"Where do 'those two' fit into this?" Puddin looked and sounded bored; however, a faint sharpness glistened in her tongue.
Robelu seemed to reciprocate the quiet malice. "Yes. Long after the two great realms took form, the Supreme King of the First saw fit to expand the Demon Realm as a whole. Twelve lesser lands, a few acres in Earth terms. After the Rymu were dispatched to lay the land, they shattered their essence to forge 'shepherds' to watch over each acre, and combined their consciousness into one 'Supreme' Rymu to keep the lot in check. But this on its own, I'd imagine, was a colossal task. These lands weren't stagnant, but dynamic, ever-changing, impermanent; to keep track of each and every outcome, to behold all events – not just as they could be observed, but in their entirety – was a task too great for these beings."
[ BGM: Yuki Kajiura ‒ Hikari no Yukue ]
"... A Time Keeper."
"To watch over the waxes and wanes of each and every process, and ensure the very soils of the land wouldn't tear it from the inside-out. Both kings of that age held court and looked to the Glind, who'd been born to be sent across the manifest as the 'tillers' of that land; and with them, both a divine realm to serve as their training grounds and a destroyer with evil proportionate to their good, but alas. To undertake the duties of time throughout the cosmos, an imperial exam was held; though the chosen Glind, as peerless as she may've been, grew weary of the ever-growing task as mortals began to advance. As such, she nurtured two successors."
"The first, a senior Glind who excelled in all he pursued, who'd made pilgrimages across the Demon Realm beforehand and seized knowledge eclipsing even the 'shepherds' outside it. One whom others, even Venerable Lord Demigra in his youth, saw fit to follow."
"The other, a youth who failed the most basic of trials and held herself to a regard below dirt, and yet not only learned extraordinarily quickly, but held the charm and endless enthusiasm to spur aid from others, allowing her to overcome her countless shortcomings."
Puddin's eyes darted around impatiently. "So, um… how'd that 'mysterious senior guy' botch his chances?"
"After his pilgrimages," Chamel answered almost eagerly, "Mechikabura's "ʸᵉᵖ ᵗʰᵉʳᵉ ᶦᵗ ᶦˢ"ambitions soared far past his station. He was equipped to deal with the ever-dynamic space-time, but he valued power over all else. What other Glind saw horror and disgust in, he saw inspiration — from the day he was born, there lied an ever-present seed of evil just waiting to bloom. He learned the worst of dark magics and, pursuing even greater means, attempted to cheat his way into the standing of 'Supreme Kai of Time'."
"And, what, the Big Bad Devil King put a stop to him?"
Chamel shook his head.
To his slight chagrin, Robelu immediately seized the opportunity to keep running her big fat mouth. "The divine egg bestowed onto candidates, under the hand of the one called Chronoa, had been born. With its power, Chronoa opposed Mechikabura, as the higher heavens looked on. Both kings refused to interfere, seeing it as a chance in itself to prove to the other which way of life was superior. But they could never draw a true conclusion; Mechikabura's might born from scheming and ambition nearly equaled Chronoa's interconnected strength and pure pursuit of betterment… yet all the same, he lost the battle, cast from that sanctuary and into the Second realm. Did he fall short because his Way was lesser, or had he simply not followed his Way with enough fervor? Whatever the case, our Venerable Lord Demigra-"
"-Touched Tokitoki in a place or way that made him feel uncomfortable, got thrown back into the Demon Realm, escaped, got thrown in Extradimensional Time Out, escaped AGAIN, and I'm sure Hushies over there can tell you the rest."
Robelu frowned back.
Chamel closed it before mitts could be cast. "Lord Demigra revolutionized the Demon Realm, but that's beside the point. The Dark Empire that Mechikabura forged in his reshaping of the Second realm has ultimately resulted in all of this."
He stopped, and the others quickly followed suit.
The horizon was broken. It was like a pile of shattered glass, both grounded and mid-fall, as tall as a mountain range. Reflections of skies yellow, red, green, and ever-changing shined through them, along with the perpetual black and maroon of the dark demon realm. In a macabre, incomprehensible sense, it was beautiful.
"Magics strong enough to tear the fabrics of the mortal realm from within our own… levels of ki which rivaled and surpassed that of the Rymu… all used to contest each other, over, and over, without pause. Not even the Demon Realm could shoulder such a burden for so long."
Robelu had fallen silent.
The red-headed elven demon turned. "That's to say nothing of the realm's subjugation by Mechikabura's hands, one that Abura bent the knee toward in exchange for his own safety. And now, the three realms – the mystic, the dark, and the untamed tempest in between – are collapsing in on themselves. This is why we ask of your assistance."
"OK," the demi-demon goddess crossed her arms, "That's touching and all, but…
What the hell do we get for un-fucking your screw ups?"
The Demon Realm saw it fit to answer her question.
[ BGM: Akira Ifukube – Destroyah's Final Form ]
With a warhead's shockwave, it appeared.
In that moment, if something had eyes, they were wide open with fear.
A skyscraper of protruding, swirling muscle tendons, with ten clawed, perpetually lashing-out arms clad in long orb ornaments stretching for miles, a gyroscopic lower half forging a constant chain reaction, and an abyss bristled with rows of long, hanging fangs stretching outward.
Its roar was nonsense. No object, no entity, no combination of forces could replicate it – mortal, demonic or divine – and the five each heard something different as their brains struggled to understand what was tearing at their ears.
For the second time, Puddin and Robelu acted first, becoming divine demons and firing torrents of magic and ki with instinctual, feral war cries as their beady eyes twitched in their sockets.
It was gone.
The others lowered their arms, sweat falling down their faces like comets. Only then had they realized just how far back they'd been blasted.
"What…" Son stammered. "What was…"
"N-n... No problem," Puddin gulped. "It's no problem."
"I-is that r-right?" Robelu asked, wiping off her own dribbling beads. "Noth-hing is stopping such horrors from sp-preading to the mortal r-realm in t-time. If that isn't enough, who's to stop it from e-entering your sa-sanctuary?"
Puddin looked down at her still-quivering hand. A twitching fist curled.
"O-oh get over yourself. All intelligent life fears what it doesn't understand." Robelu got closer with a shaky smirk. "You should feel h-honored. That f-feeling icing your f-flesh is… is intelligence."
She had no retort. Her oppressor stuttered no less than 5 times, and she had no retort.
Ace's face, all the while, had scrunched.
"...?" Chamel noticed. "Don't pity yourself too much. The fact of the matter is, the Demon Realm is on the brink of self-implosion. If it isn't fixed, even the Mystic realm's innocents will be…"
Chanel looked again.
Ace felt something else.
The smaller demon's eyes flared. "(THAT BLAST EARLIER…!)' He looked around as subtly as he possibly could. "(No…! No!)"
— there was a hatred within him that never left his heart. Not a single sin from its source, he'd ever forgiven. Nothing stolen from him, he'd ever forgotten.
A hatred that transcended non-existence itself. To sense him here, despite every countermeasure by his vassals, was a trifling task.
Ace's head spun with rage, fist in tow, and he struck at the air.
And the air cracked.
"WHA!?"
"SO THAT WAS…!?"
"(My illusion…)" Robelu's eyes lost light.
— a dead tortoise. A massive corpse, above which a great blue pyramid slowly spun in place.
The red-haired saiyan shot into the immobile fortress. Chamel couldn't fully extend his hand before the tetrahedron blew apart.
Puddin and Goku eyed each other. Before the two could follow, emerald barriers surrounded them. He didn't have to issue an order for his partner to charge with all of her heart.
"DAMMIT! TIME RAIL!"
Hundreds of snowflake-esque ruptures sprang from her wand to Ace's feet, reversing in its wake the prism he'd blasted through.
Ace continued to bulldoze through it, sending them up in crystalline fragments before landing with a rage.
Just as Robelu crashed into the unmoving saiyan's back in a desperate charge, he saw it.
A pristine throne staged dead-center on an empty platform, surrounded by darkness.
Slumped across it, a deathly husk. Adorned in blue and gold, with a flower of vermilion flame standing atop his head, a fanged maw shaking with every breath painfully sucked in. Etched into and across his skin, white and glowing marks of what looked like chains, as if he'd been branded by iron mail.
He saw the patroller, and raised himself.
"... ah." He tried for a sinister grin. "It's been too long."
Anger broiled from the bottom of his gut. Only in stands of ki, it visibly surfaced.
"I must say, boy, it was a bold and stupid move to traipse into my fortress uninvite-"
He made a gross stammer and fell back into a slump. The act of tensing for combat, readying anything even remotely demonic in nature – never mind his dark magic – had left him in shambles.
Robelu rushed to his side. "LORD DEMIGRA!"
"Ha-...!" He tried to swat her away, revealing his fragmented hands — dust-like essence fell from the cracks forming around his right, primarily. "Unhand me…!"
"Your Lordship…" Robelu had been too frazzled to meet the impotent swipe with any sort of feigned injury. She swallowed, and backed away, as she watched the demon god struggle to seat himself without screaming in pain.
"Curses…!" Demigra growled to himself. "If only…" He paused, then chuckled to himself in pained hiccups."No… if only I were strong enough on my own… or if that damned dragon'd just given me anything else…!"
It replayed in the future warrior's mind as if it were yesterday.
— a wish to grant him power to oppose a Dark King. In hindsight, the result was laughably obvious.
The wish granted him resistance to light magic, the same way a bunker suit would grant a human resistance to a flow of lava.
The weapon was long gone. And yet, it still ate at the wicked Majin foolish enough to wield it.
"Perhaps…" He sighed, attempting to adjust himself and painstakingly so, "I've been waiting for this moment all along."
[ BGM: Yuki Kajiura ‒ Down In The Zero ]
Ace's livid eyes flared.
As did Robelu's. "... whAT…!?"
Demigra quietly snorted — it sounded like choking. "I know you harbor a grudge. I've seen it. My defeat at your hands couldn't have been enough to account for all those I left dead, for that city I tore apart before you. So go on. End this charade we've been dancing around."
The casual tone by which he addressed his crimes made it clear. Even if this being concealed itself behind the veil of a prayer booth, he'd be unmistakably a demon.
Ki poured into a fist that began to split his hand open and form an orb, Ace's fangs bared and eyes hazed with fury.
"No…" Robelu lumbered between the two, raising her wand. "No, I won't let you!"
Her form began to fluctuate between demon and demon god, horns locked in a painful, in-between protrusion. Her inability to overcome her fatigue and hold on, to spontaneously shatter her limits in the face of losing a loved one like so many mortals before her, frustrated the demonic scout into a quivering mess.
Ace's scowl only grew worse at the display. In fact, it was enough to spark Super Saiyan.
— not even her stable full power was enough, now. All she could do was slowly shake her head, a furious scowl withering into more of a pout. "You can't…!"
"This impulsiveness is unbecoming of you, Robelu…" Demigra sounded just as annoyed, denied a spiteful death and sweet release. "Do you really think you can stop what's long-since been set in motion with words alone?"
She bore fangs as her grip tightened, pleading with herself for more power. "BUT EVEN STILL...!"
"You posture like a paper tiger. Let it go..."
The demoness seemed to concede, lowering her wand.
"... I can't…"
Robelu's knees hit the ground, and her head followed. "PLEASE…!"
Ace's brows lifted, his fangs receding behind his lips in a crooked, puzzled frown.
Demigra's raised in an agonized rage. "Stop this…!"
"I have followed this man for over ten thousand years… I've watched him overcome a bastard god's forces and outwit them at every turn… and I've seen him pull others, pull this Robelu, from the depths of despair to wish for a greater world…! I owe this man everything…! " She clawed at the barren ground in a bid to cling to her composure, but a pathetic whimper escaped her. "This man is my everything…! Yet in his current state, he can barely breathe without pain…! The air of the Demon Realm is all that's kept him alive until now! Hiding him away is all that I can do to ease his agony!"
A different, deeper, far-brighter rage consumed Ace. Growls began to seep from his quaking maw.
"Are you asking him to PITY me!?"
The thought of her current look racked Robelu with shame. Her head rose, before slamming onto the ground once more, cracking the whole of it. "HE ONLY HAS SUCH MUCH TIME LEFT! ARE YOU SO CRUEL AS TO SLAY A MAN IN HIS FINAL HOUR!? THE VERY MAN INSTRUMENTAL IN YOUR VICTORY, WHO STILL SUFFERS AS A RESULT!?" Tears could no longer be held back. "No…! Not like this…! He deserves to see the Demon Realm he loved prosper once again before he passes…! How could you deny Lord Demigra that much...?"
Between the ever-rising maelstrom of the future warrior's murderous intent, and the humiliation of her now-silent lord, she couldn't stop her trembling. After all, Demigra was right — she was attempting to stop an event that had been in motion since his freeing from the crack of time. Her act seemed futile.
As if she were mortal, she struggled anyway.
"That is why I… I'm begging you, ha-... -ve mer… cy… on him…!"
Ace gave up on the blast. As if having finally confirmed for himself that the god was too close to death to pose threat, he advanced with a fist, his eyes frenzied.
"Yes…"
"-!? No!"
"Mrrh…!
"NOOO!" Robelu sprang up, but the saiyan's aura sent her back in a heap. She pulled herself back up and did everything she could do.
"DON'T DO IT!" she wailed.
"RRRH–!"
Demigra smiled.
"PLEASE, DON'T DO THIS!"
"HRRAAAAAAA—!"
The throne shattered.
"I had no idea you could keep it up this long!" Puddin sneered within the cracked-to-shit barrier. "Your hand must be a lucky woman!"
Chamel, a now-falling demon god, wiped more of the black blood streaming from his nose. "JS… SHUT… UP…!"
"HAA!" Goku, a Super Saiyan 4, finally shattered his cage. "ACE!" He yelled, charging down.
"No…!"
Puddin gave a sinister chuckle, and her head tilt toward the small demon reflected it ten-fold. "Aww~, looks like we're wrapping this up… well, it was fun watching you split apart while it lasted, but whatever you're trying to hide from me's already dead and gone from the sound of it! Toodles!" she goaded, before shattering her own and blasting toward, now, one of two holes in the prism.
She noticed Goku's stopping, and followed suit to take a look.
"... what the…"
Ace's fist had passed the throne, shattering its backrest.
Demigra's eyes were stuck in stasis.
"Demigra… he's still-"
"Alive…" Chamel whispered in relief.
Robelu only stared, tears still falling down her bewildered expression.
[ BGM: Aoki Nozomi ‒ Two Evil Stars ]
The Dark Demon Realm's maroon sky shined down upon the fallen demon god. "But why…?"
The patroller's face, still streaked with rage, held not a sliver of doubt in his act. He hit Demigra with an icy glare, raising a finger toward the new opening. Demigra turned in his new stool, facing the Demon Realm's current state of tempest first-hand.
"Are you telling me…" At the sight of his dying realm, he spared a tear. "To bear witness?"
Ace nodded.
"... kh. Even now, you'd still lend credence to a word I say...?" Demigra shut his eyes, clawing as what now amounted to a stool. "You damned... monkey brute..."
With that, the future warrior turned toward Robelu, hand still toward the distorted sky.
She slowly reintroduced herself to composure as she spoke. "... There are three dragon balls native to the Demon Realm. At one point, they stayed put within the Mystic… but ever since the three realms began to converge, powers have emerged to seize them for their own means. Now, they're scattered across its whole." She stood. "If we gather them, we can undo the collapse. The mortal layer will also be safe from any grand Demon Realm incursions."
"Awesome!" Puddin clapped her hands, stupid cat smile in tow. "Now that you told us everything we've gotta know, we can just kill you guys and-..." Her lip curled in disgust. "'We'?"
Robelu folded her arms. "Need I remind you how much larger a single world is than any seen in the mortal realm, princess?"
"As of now," Chamel touched down, joining her, "We are the only two willing to work with you that have any means of tracking them down. Their composition is nothing like the Dark dragon balls, it isn't as easy as tracking a devilish energy across mortal space-time."
"And this should go without say," the demon secretary stated directly toward the half-blood princess, "But should you kill my master, our ties are severed."
"Aw~ look who's got leverage now!" Puddin """smiled.""" "It's almost like you're your own woman…"
"Say what you will, there's no other way to keep an impulsive bastard like you in check…"
Fist slammed into palm. "OK! So we gather the Dragon Balls, stop whatever weird stuff happenin' with the Demon Realm, and get back to the Time Patrol!" Goku looked to the sky with a grin. "I'm not gonna lie, I've been dyin' to get away from all that ad hominem junk!"
"How do you mess up 'administrative' so bad you land on ad fucking homine-"
"Alright!" Goku shot into the sky. "Let's do this!"
"... he doesn't even know where he's going."
Ace stared.
"... that's like a fifty year-old man."
Ace stared.
Puddin looked over to Chamel. "WHY ARE YOU STILL HERE!? START TRACKING THOSE BALLS, BALL TRACKER!"
Chamel jumped back a bit. "Mh- yes, we should be going now, regardl-"
"YOU'RE LOSING HIM, FIDO! MUSH!"
"RRH-!" The red-clad sorcerer flew on, and Puddin followed.
The future warrior sighed, preparing to fly as well.
"Ace…"
He stopped.
Robelu finished clearing the last, lingering tear, sending it glinting away with her aura. "... thank you."
She levitated before taking off, and Ace – after paying Demigra one final glare – followed.
The demon god continued to gaze into the fractal calamity above, as the dimensional space slowly resealed.
"I can only pray you see this as some debt to be paid unto me." His weak fist curled. "I couldn't stomach such a sickening thing…"
He grimaced in despair.
"As the kindness of a mortal I've tormented so greatly."
"HRRR-!"
[ BGM: Yuya Mori ‒ Counterattack ]
A devil with five heads sailed into the air, a line of purple blood trailing beneath.
The caped striker responsible swung his raised leg down and shot his momentum into a back-kick, both obliterating an obscenely-shredded jack o'lantern and sending another spiked fish-looking oaf careening away into several of his cohorts.
"LOOK OUT, MISTER!"
A fourth, fox-looking perp wielding two ominously-glowing blades leapt off the top of the adobe, sending the red-headed patroller backing up and pressing the assault with wild swings that cut up the space between them, the saiyan responding with backward bounds that grew shorter and shorter each time. The fox demon let out a victorious screech as they recklessly lashed out for what should've been the last time, only for Ace to dig a heel into the ground and let off an aerial flip, blinding his enemy before using the snap of closed space to drive a round-trip heel into their face that dramatically shortened it with a grisly crunch.
A smaller, horned demon suddenly ran out of the hut. Ace turned on a dime.
"THAT WAS AWESOME, MISTER!" they yelled, hopping with enthusiasm.
The caped saiyan smiled, before an aggressive quake compelled him to motion the magical person back inside.
A hulking, one-eyed tusked behemoth flailed wildly in the air, sending wheels of flame to and fro, continuing to coat in dark red what should've been yellow skies. "STAND STILL, DAMNED VERMIN!"
Not a moment later, another comet zipped past, knocking him off-kilter yet again. The volley didn't stop, growing faster and faster until the onslaught seemed omnidirectional. On the final whir passed the titan, two long strands attached themselves around the sides of his head, lights appearing between them like a runway.
"How's this for still?" The voice asked from on-high, penetrating his thoughts.
The cyclops sneered. "TCH! THAT WILL DO...!" His single eye condensed a metric shit ton of demon energy, taking the form of a red-hot flame as the comet careened toward him on a one-way course. "YOU HAVE MY GRATITUDE, FOOLISH GIRL!" He roared as it fired.
The comet bounded at an angle. Every light disappeared in an instant, save the single explosion that kicked off the redirection.
By the time the goliath registered the lights now behind him, his spine had been snapped in half, his body sent hurdling to the ground.
"Oh, please!" The comet untucked itself returning to the form of a pearl-grey Majin girl. "The pleasure's all mine!" Puddin winked.
The cyclops's eye reappeared on the top of its head, as did its mouth. "IS IT!?" he roared, unleashing an even fiercer firestorm at a wide-eyed Puddin. Reveling in its victory with laughter, the demon focused to get a good look at the charring remains of-
Puddin was charging directly through it.
"BUT THAT'S-" Screamed the cyclops, before suffering through a messy divorce between its head and shoulders. "Imposs..."
I NEVER get to use that move!" Puddin squee'd, before grabbing the still-active organic death ray and swinging it toward another crowd of rabble rousers. By the end, all that remained was a smoking, red pole rooted to the ground.
"Oh my god. I killed Goku. Again."
"I DODGED IT!"
"... Yaaaay."
Descending down the extended As-You-Wish stick, the titular Earth-raised saiyan battled no less than thirty demons in the tattered remains of the Dark Empire's grunt suits. Through tight-knit acrobatics and peerless martial skill, Son used the superior numbers of his enemies against them, periodically shortening the power pole for a lash or a thrust that socked the wind from five minimum combatants.
"HE'S ONE STINKIN' MORTAL!" one in a golden visor yelled. "YOU WANNA LOOK BAD IN FRONNA LORD MECHIKABURA ONCE HE'S BACK!? KILL HIS ASS ALREADY!"
Goku promptly charged him. "So you're these guys' leader, huh!? You oughta be somethin' else!"
"KH! I'VE BEEN WAITIN'A GET MY HANDS ON YOU, MONKEY!"
The saiyan sneered, breaking his guard before readying his fists. "WELL HERE I AM! COME ON!"
"GLADLY!" he roared before missing the cross he put all his weight into.
After landing a devastating blow to the abdomen, Goku parried both the ensuing uppercut and knee, before snap-kicking the devil in the chin, dashing for an axe at a blinding speed, and then jump-kicking straight into center mass, cracking the gold-visor's chassis into pieces before preparing an attack in his hands.
"KAA—MEE—..."
"CHARGE HIM YOU IDIOTS!" He screeched between compressed lungs. "HE CAN'T FIGHT TWO WAYS AT ONCE!"
"HAA—MEE—...!"
In spite of the prior experiences demonstrating that, yes, yes he could, the demonic forces dashed forward.
One moment, a minion's hand reached the saiyan's back. The next, the rest of them crashed right into their master.
"THE HELL...!?"
They heard the gathering of ki, now right behind the gold visor.
"... shit."
Goku cut loose. "HAAAA—!"
The blast painted the sky in a glorious blue. Once it faded, back was the yellow that its residents were familiar with.
Goku let out a steady breath, before turning around. The last grunt stood, shaking as if face-to-face with a feral animal. Calling back his staff as the mook tried to flee, the palm tree-headed saiyan aimed it.
"Power Pole extend."
Popped in the back of his head, the mook crashed to the ground. They tried to crawl away, only for a high heel to drive through his hand.
"Greetings, traitor."
"Here are your options: be a good boy and tell us why," Robelu created a map from nothingness, one in which a beacon slowly wandered through, "This Dragon Ball keeps moving. Or..." The heel turned, painstakingly slow. "Or this gets slower, and slower, until seconds outlast seasons. Now choose."
The three patrollers touched down onto ground level, and several demons approached them.
"I don't know who you folks are, or how you've arrived here," one quadro-horned man said, sharp teeth gleaming with gratitude, "But thank you."
"I'm your goddess by the way!" Puddin chirped happily. "Just lettin' ya know!"
"No she isn't!" Robelu yelled.
"Wh-..." Puddin looked back as if she would've pimp-smacked her if she was in arm's... if she was in normal arm's distance. She didn't feel like stretching. "No- No one was even talking to you, asswipe, shut up!"
Robelu started stomping. "Blasphemer! False Usurper!"
"I'M GONNA COME OVER THERE!"
"FRAUDULENT MONGREL!"
"PLEA-HEASE STOP IT!" the soldier sobbed, Chamel feeling sympathy for the first time in several millennia as he desperately held the two back.
Ace waved a hand in front of the demon child's eyes. The latter's innate craving for violence, however, had been activated. "Pop pop, I wanna fight like him when I'm 100!"
"Hm-hm-hm, careful now, son! You're only giving yourself two decades!" Both shared a laugh, and the rest of the small town joined.
Whatever the joke was, Ace didn't get it.
Goku sighed. "Speakin'a time, gee... we've been here for a whole week. Feels like no time's passed, huh?"
The red-haired patroller shrugged, his own inability to relate emphasized with a shake of the head.
"Yeah, I guess it's up to the person..." Goku noticed Ace's head turn to the sky, in an uneasy manner. "... there's no need to worry about the guys back home. There ain't much worse the universe can throw at 'em that it hasn't already. Whatever's in store, they're ready."
Ace turned to the black-haired saiyan, who smiled with a strong nod. The red-haired saiyan's face softened, before mirroring the gesture.
[ ED: reach up to the universe ‒ S.T.A.R.S. ]
Goku grinned. "Now, it's still up to us to make everyone's lives a bit easier."
Both turned to the winds, as the interrogation continued. Puddin had gotten involved.
Ace tightened his fists with a convicted smile.
"Back here and over there!"
1/23/2025 PATCH NOTES: QoL tweaks to dialogue. Puddin and Demigra say better things. If that makes sense.
Yo! OP Here!
An ACTUAL short chapter this time, and right before 2025! Sick! Shame I passed up 700k though.
Yep, Demon Real chapter, time to crank out the Heroes manga and sift through that shit for like 30 minutes every time I get stuck, only to have to look up EVEN MORE Heroes shit just to get more explanations. But all in all, fun, short chapter. Lore expos, some funny shit, big reveal, dramatic moment, some action, and sealing character resolve. Honestly though, if you think I went too far with the lore dumps, I get it completely... but I really, really, really like giving exposition in mythic form. That's just a thing I really like doing. Hopefully those portions of it, like the dumbass Rock Paper Scissors game shaping the cosmos, was fun to read, because I enjoyed writing it out. Fun fact, I finished the chapter on the 30th, but I held back on it because I had ONE action scene and also there was no post-week update on what the gang was doing near the end. So I delayed it for a bit and I JUST added everything after the close-out on Shirogame. (That's the name of Demigra's dumbass turtle fortress btw.) I had an unforeseen amount of fun writing it. Then again, I just really, really like fighting scenes, so it tracks. Enjoy!
So this was all my bid to infuse Daima with Heroes. I took the idea of 3 demon worlds and expanded it into 3 layers in general: The Mystic Realm (Daima. Magic. Mystic.), the Dark Realm (Dark Demon Realm.) and the "Tempest" Realm (ye no smartass statement from me this time). The third one's a concept that I thought was cool: Chaos, but For Real. A plane so unfathomably chaotic that it contradicts the phrase itself and is a world built on infinite paradoxes. I've been cooking this shit since October and now I finally get to somewhat explore it here. The Big Thing that spawned out of nowhere? It will maybe never happen again.
I really like Daima, actually. It feels like GT but made by guys who GOT Dragon Ball. I mean that statement is wild, I get it, but I can't shake that same "whimsy" feeling that I got watching Dragon Ball in 2020 when I watch Daima. (Sometimes it's boring as sin, but ALL OF THE BLACK STAR BALL ARC was boring as sin. Also we get Gyoniho instead of Dipshit Trunks, so there's also that.) I just love how it doesn't take itself nearly as serious as GT did, as well. Of course, Demon Realm exploration has been something I've been wanting ever since I learned what Heroes is, and at long last, Dragon Ball provided. It's awesome that I got to this part of the story at the time I was able to. Thank you, Toriyama.
So the really dramatic scene with Robel, Demigra and Ace? For half of it, I ripped off Monster with Tenma and the Lieberts. This one Monster AMV was stuck in my head when I wrote it. Hopefully Ace's struggle was conveyed well enough, being angry that Demigra has done so much horrid shit to him, and yet someone's throwing their pride aside and begging on hand and knee for his life. Ace is kinda annoying to write, considering he, y'know, is silent.
On that, Puddin. If the way I write her comes off as a bit tryhard, good. If the way I write her sucks, that's NOT good, that's actually upsetting because I think I'm doing aight with the way I want her character to go. But yeah, real-life nods and lingo, that's, like, SO her, so I wanted to make that a part of Puddin's traits alongside the rest of her somewhat edgier self. I'm having fun writing her because I get to keep myself on less of a leash, while simultaneously typing out shit I would've never seen myself typing like 4 years before this.
Thunderbolt Fantasy will never get another episodic season ever again and a part of me is dead now because of that. S4 was... aight, I won't lie, but an aight TBF season is a GREAT Anything Else season so I'm not complaining. That was THEIR deep dive into the Demon Realm, funny enough. In case I never mentioned it beforehand, I'm taking a lot of influence from Kei Gai for the way Towa's interpreted in this fic - stalwart demons doing what they can with what they have to support their demon brethren, even though they're dickheads at their core.
Aight, one more thing. So uh, these past few weeks, not only did I snort the Dub version of Lain (GOATed btw), I read AND rewatched ALL of Fist of the North Star. ALL of it, 1 and 2. The OTHER half of the dramatic scene was all Hokuto. Kenshiro telling Shachi "You will bear witness to my battles!" was my inspo for the scene's end. I don't think I've covered in enough detail how much I love Fist of the North Star in this fic yet. Funny enough, Toriyama...'s editor Torishima took a SHIT TON of tips n' tricks from FotNS, and it's partly because of it and Dragon Ball's 80s rivalry in Jump with it that DB eventually steered into its Z direction. Just something cool because I... FUCKING love both series and all their flaws. Just.. so sincere.
But yeah. That's about it. Last chapter of 2024. This next one might settle things.
Till then, see ya next year.