Chapter 188: Chapter 9 - Part 4 - Failures of the Past, Lessons of the Future

Third Person Point of View

— ○ ● ○ —

[Hahahaha!!!] Ddraig laughed as he killed magicians that belonged to Hitler's group. He, along with Albion, were having the time of their lives.

Various elemental whips appeared and latched onto Ddraig, confusing him—the elemental attacks tried to hurt him, but they were so weak that he felt nothing from them. He looked at them, then followed where they led, and he found Heinrich Himmler.

[Heinrich Himmler! Show me your moves!] the [Welsh Dragon] shouted before flying towards him. Heinrich kept his cool and summoned various imps of different colors before he ordered them to charge at him.

[Naïve!!] Ddraig shouted before enveloping his body with flames and charging straight through them, decimating the imps. But to his surprise, they came back and started firing darts at him in different elemental colors. [Hooh? That's interesting; is this some kind of innate ability!?]

Heinrich Himmler didn't reply to the rambunctious dragon but simply kept up his attacks. Behind him were various magicians who assisted him by amplifying his attacks; some also helped directly attack the [Welsh Dragon].

However, because Ddraig was much more powerful than them, none of their attacks truly affected him. It only tickled him, making him laugh as a result. Ddraig's chest suddenly expanded, and he breathed out a large breath attack towards them.

Because of Kuroka's earlier shenanigans, the buildings all around Germany were destroyed, so he didn't need to worry about destroying them with his own attacks. In response to Ddraig's attack, they produced hundreds of defensive magic circles; however, these were rendered useless in front of his attack as they tore through it—and killed several magicians in the process.

Unfortunately for the [Welsh Dragon], Heinrich Himmler had teleported away to avoid the attack. But Ddraig had also used his superior speed to appear behind Heinrich, confusing him as it seemingly looked like the dragon had disappeared.

Ddraig got as close as he could with his dragon body without making a sound and asked, [Lookin' for me?] before Heinrich could turn around, he headbutted the human, sending him back to the ground as he howled with laughter.

Heinrich stood back up; the debris all around him reminded him of the war he had fought long ago, and a sense of nostalgia overcame him, but the smell of smoke pulled him out of it. He stared back up at the dragon above him, still laughing, and he shook his head.

"Another loss for us, huh?" he mumbled. However, he then looked at his own hands. "Where did that come from? Perhaps the former host of his body remembers it? But they no longer exist…how fascinating."

The 'new' Heinrich didn't know how to feel about this, but he knew in the back of his mind that they would lose this. However, since they do Hitler's bidding, they cannot go against his orders—whether they live or die, it is up to him to decide that.

"At least we can live a short new life," he mumbled before summoning a cigarette and lighting it. Numerous impacts appeared around him again, as did whips. "Come, [Welsh Dragon]."

Ddraig flew down towards the man and transformed into his human form—as he did, his right arm was engulfed in [Blazing Inferno of Scorching Flames].

Heinrich ordered the imps and whips to attack Ddraig; they quickly shot up, but as they got close to the flames, they were immediately burned up. Upon seeing this, Heinrich sighed and fixed his hat. He did not try to run away or avoid the attack—he knew his time was up.

He removed the cigarette from his mouth and let out a puff of smoke. "Hopefully, whatever I am, and whoever I am—I get to silently reincarnate next time I 'come back'," he muttered to himself, a tired smile appearing on his face before the flaming punch arrived.

Everything below Ddraig was scorched into nothingness. The remaining ground and small walls of buildings were burned and melted. The body of Heinrich Himmler…was no more; his soul was also left untouched by Ddraig's flames, as he knew that whoever's soul was being forced to do this wanted nothing out of this operation.

[See you 'round space cowboy,] Ddraig said, using his index and middle fingers to salute him. It was faint, but he heard the man's chuckles as he left the world again. He turned to face the rest that managed to survive. [Now then! Partner said I could choose who to bring in,] he said with a grin. [Who can sing and dance for me?]

— ○ ● ○ —

"[Vanishing Dragon], I will face him; may I trust you with the rest?" Margit Eberbach asked.

{Very well. It seems you have some 'history' with him,} replied Albion.

She nodded, jumped from his back, and landed on the ground. Albion targeted the soldiers and magicians behind Hermann Göring and blew them away before following them. Margit Eberbach stared at the man in front of her—she was told by Rias Gremory and the dragons that different souls reside within these bodies, so whoever they were previously, they do not inhibit those bodies anymore.

Even still, Margit wanted to try to communicate with them—the past year and current year have seen many miracles happen, so she wants to see if they will happen now that she has teamed up with Team [DxD].

"Hermann Göring, I am Margit Eberbach, founder and leader of the group called the [Hound United], and we mainly operate as a black-ops team for the German military. We are also responsible for dealing with the supernatural side of things," she explained.

"You are aware that I'm not him, right? Because of how we're programmed by those guys in the Khaos Order, we can't disobey Adolf's orders. It actually feels a bit hellish," said Hermann Göring.

"I am. However, I would like to ask you to see if their soul is—"

"I have no idea. I don't have talent in magic, but I'm a natural touki wielder, so there's that. But if you ask me to search for any traces of him within me, then there's probably none left. They cleansed these corpses before reusing them," he explained.

Hermann Göring then changed into a stance and wrapped his body in touki. "Well, since I was tasked to fight, I may as well, right? Please try not to have ill feelings towards me," he said before charging Margit.

Margit brought out her tonfas and covered her body with her own touki. The touki around Hermann Göring's arm changed and became denser; he thrust his arm towards her stomach. Margit waited till the last second before sidestepping the attack and bringing down her right tonfa on her man, but Hermann blocked it with his touki, surprising her.

"I told you, didn't I? I'm a natural at this," he repeated both sadly and proudly.

"…So am I," replied Margit as she slammed her foot into Hermann's chest, sending him up into the sky.

However, when she looked up at him, Hermann had managed to block her kick with his arms, and the man was smiling at her. Margit was impressed with the man and decided to take him a bit more seriously.

Spinning her tonfas, she sprung towards him and shrouded them in touki. She slammed them towards him, and Hermann threw a punch; both of them collided. The winner was clear as Hermann's hand exploded, making him grimace.

"You may be a natural at it, but I have trained with it longer. It doesn't matter if you're a genius or have talent—if you don't train with that talent, you're good as useless," she said. She spun around and kicked him in the face, cracking a few bones and slamming him towards the ground.

Margit landed on the ground, staring at the man. Hermann Göring had gotten up, clutching his missing arm. He felt indescribable pain but did not voice it; he thought it wasn't worth it—to him, it wasn't originally his body, so in turn, it wasn't his pain. As strangely convoluted as it was, those were his feelings on the matter.

Using his touki, he did his best at cauterizing the wound, and it stopped bleeding. Hermann Göring breathed a sigh of relief and asked, "Why did you specifically want to fight this body—why Hermann Göring of all people?"

"My family is connected to Hermann Göring; in a way, you could say I'm one of his descendants. Knowing and hearing about this operation, I personally asked for our team to participate in this. He shared who was going to be in your group," she explained and pointed her tonfa at him.

"I wanted to ask why he involved himself with Adolf Hitler. I am not admonishing nor am I approving of his actions; the choices back then were quite obvious for who was German. You either side with him, or you don't, meaning you may be killed. Even if you didn't support his ruling, siding with him as a citizen may mean you will live, right?"

Hermann Göring looked at her and said, "So you wanted to ask the original soul if he fully and truly supported Adolf Hitler's Nazi party and political views, huh?"

"Yes. Whatever answer he gave me, I would accept it because what's done is done," she said and readied her tonfas again. "Now that you know, let us continue."

The man in front of her chuckled. "You're one scary lady; it makes me wonder how the original owner of this body was…"

The soul in Hermann Göring's body was a troublemaker. He didn't care much for education, as he skipped classes a lot and only knew the basics of many things, hence why he didn't know the details of wars like World War One or Two.

However, even he knew of the name Hitler, so when he was put into this body and had no way of resisting, he felt despair—more than any in his life, and it left him depressed, but he couldn't express it and could only follow the man's orders.

Hermann Göring made peace with his fate—that he would die again—but in a way, he was excited since he could rest again. Whether he would go to hell or heaven, he wasn't sure, nor if he would reincarnate peacefully after his time there.

When he looked back up, Hermann Göring saw that Margit Eberbach had taken off her eye patch and her other red eye. At a speed he couldn't follow, she appeared below, and before he could react, he felt something slam into his stomach—they were her tonfas.

Hermann was blown away, but the woman quickly followed him and slammed her foot into his chest, forcing him to the ground again. He tried to retaliate by grabbing her leg, but the tip of her other tonfa opened and fired magic bullets towards him, rendering his other hand useless.

This didn't stop Hermann, as he used his mouth this time to try to bite her leg, but again, Margit slapped her tonfa to the side of his head, further expanding the crater below him. She got off him and jumped back, watching from a distance as Hermann Göring's body slowly stood up, battered and bloody.

"Do you have any last words?" Margit asked, crimson flames abruptly appearing all over her body.

With a croaky voice, Hermann Göring chuckled. "I…wanted to eat pizza one last time."

Margit stretched her left arm out with her tonfa and brought her right arm back. She slightly crouched down and was ready to strike. She briefly closed her eyes and then opened them back up. "…I recommend the Flammkuchen."

Margit charged towards Hermann, a giant flaming lion appearing around her.

"…Flammkuchen, huh? That's not even pizza, lady…" he muttered before going up in a fiery explosion.

Margit Eberbach stood behind the flaming circular explosion and glanced back at the man. "Ruhe in Frieden (Rest in peace)." She then summoned her eyepatch back and put it on. Looking around, she said, "Now then, let's take down the boss."

— ○ ● ○ —

Martin Bormann's group was wiped out—there wasn't much left of them, the [Brave Saints], especially Dulio, who had taken care of most of them. While they didn't kill them because of their beliefs, they were still captured and had the anti-magic cuffs used on them.

The only one left was Martin Bormann himself. The soul within him was a talented magician who died due to a powerful stray devil, and since then he has harbored hatred towards the supernatural at large, especially devils.

Martin summoned numerous magic circles, which included elemental, Norse, demonic, fallen angel, black, white, fairy, and a few summoning magics. Without another moment's notice, he fired them all towards Dulio and the few [Brave Saints] with him. He had also summoned ghostly wyverns from his summoning magic circles, and they started firing breath attacks towards them.

Griselda created a light bow and fired light arrows towards the attacks; once they made contact, they formed spheres of light around them, trapping them and forcing the attacks to explode in them.

"Griselda-nee-san, let me do it," Dulio said while putting his hand to his side, indicating her and the other [Brave Saints] to stop. They all looked at their leader and backed off. "Can I ask again why you're doing this?"

Martin Bormann sighed. "I am not the original soul that inhabits this body, and as far as I can tell, he's no longer here. I am forced to do these things, and truthfully, I like it. I hate the supernatural," he told him.

"Before my death, I found out the existence of the supernatural, and coincidentally, I found out I had a great affinity for magic, but before I could realize that potential, a stray devil accidentally found me and killed me. I bore a hatred for the supernatural and any species within it. Of course, I learned all of this after my death and resurrection. Nothing you will say will change my mind," he said, creating more magic circles.

Dulio frowned and felt pity for him. "…I understand that your life was cut short because of the supernatural, but doing this and endangering the lives of the innocent isn't going to change anything!"

Martin rubbed his forehead. "Are you mentally challenged? I just said I can't defy the orders of my leader—it's literally ingrained into me. If you want to stop me, you need to kill me or capture me. Now shut up and fight me, [Joker] of Heaven."

Dulio sighed and brought both hands up. From them, he created giant, multi-colored bubbles from his finger tips that were shaped into rings. He then sent them towards Martin, who looked curiously at them but avoided them.

Dulio smiled before creating a magic circle and applying a powerful wind spell that forced one of the bubbles to hit Martin. Martin stopped moving mid-air as tears fell from his eyes; however, to the surprise of everyone, he looked back at Dulio with furrowed brows.

"We were informed of this technique, [Joker]. If you think this is enough to stop me, then you're mistaken—but I will thank you for letting me remember those things. Now then, stop playing around and fight me."

The sub-leader of [DxD] nervously laughed and scratched the back of his head. "I wanted to resolve this without any more fighting, but I guess it can't be helped," he said, activating his Balance Breaker.

From behind him sprouted twelve golden wings, and four halos appeared above his head. [Flagello di Colori del Arcobaleno, Speranza di Briscola], Dulio's subspecies Balance Breaker for [Zenith Tempest].

"Here I come then, Martin-san!" Dulio shouted before vanishing.

Martin had already created numerous magic circles around him for the inevitable attack from the angel. As soon as Dulio came close to him, he activated them, firing numerous magic attacks at him, but to his surprise, all of them were trapped in bubbles as Dulio passed him by.

Each of his magic attacks was ravaged by countless elemental attacks within those bubbles, and Martin quickly flew away, but Dulio followed after him, firing light balls at him. The angel still wanted to resolve this peacefully, but he knew in the back of his head that it wasn't coming true.

The two of them essentially played tag in the skies of Germany. Martin kept attacking Dulio with magic attacks while the angel destroyed them with his light powers or used his Balance Breaker's bubbles to nullify them. All the while, the other [Brave Saints] watched or flew off to different sections to help out more.

Diethelm Waldseemüller, [Team Trump Card of Heaven's] [Queen], watched this play out and said, "Even now he's still trying to save him—Dulio is way too kind, or did he get more influenced by Jin-kun?"

"It's always been in his nature, but I believe Jin did influence him more than necessary," replied Griselda.

Diethelm laughed and looked at Griselda. "That may be so—by the way, are you pregnant—" Griselda Quarta looked back at him with cold, dead eyes and smiled. "…N-never mind."

She was not—however, she gained a bit of weight recently and had been slowly losing it, but it wasn't that noticeable. But Diethelm was the type to notice the most insignificant details of people, and Griselda's weight was one of them.

Griselda created her light bow and arrow again before firing two of them towards Dulio and Martin. The one that hit Dulio increased his speed, while the one that hit Martin decreased his. This caused Dulio to catch up to him and slam his fist into his chest. Once he was on the other side of Martin, a bubble encased him.

Swirling flames, violent hurricanes, freezing cold air, and vicious torrents of lighting began to attack Martin Bormann inside the bubble. However, to Dulio's surprise, the man did not scream or cry out of pain—he simply stayed still, letting tears run down his cheeks, but he also smiled throughout the process.

After a grueling few seconds, the bubble burst, and Martin was left with numerous injuries around his body. His entire body was incinerated; his left arm was missing, and his right leg was encased in ice. He had irregular breathing and was seconds away from passing out.

"This operation from the start was never going to work. I don't know what that idiot was hoping for…" Martin said and then fell to the ground. He looked up at the sky as Dulio landed beside him.

"You say you hate the supernatural, but you never really cursed me out or had anything bad to say," Dulio said while sitting beside him.

Martin chuckled. "God…you nice types are always annoying to me. Can't you mind your own business?"

"Unfortunately, once you're in [DxD], that goes out the window." Dulio also laughed as he said that.

"I mean…even if I hate the supernatural, it's mostly aimed at devils—and even then, it's towards the strays. I just fixated on hating everything since I lost it all to you—the supernatural. Also…I was led to believe that angels were the good guys and kindest out of the supernatural before I knew you guys really existed, so I couldn't really hate you."

Martin took another deep breath and said, "Kill me. I'd rather not—"

A sudden, powerful attack from the back knocked Dulio away, shocking the other [Brave Saints] nearby. When they looked back at where Martin was, a large abnormal foot had crushed his head, killing the man.

A large monster was standing on top of Martin's corpse—he had hard green scales all over his body with multiple protrusions riddling his body, yellow eyes and slits for pupils, a large snout and tail, and he wore a large t-shirt over his body.

"Wha—is that a crocodile standing on two legs?" Dulio asked in shock. "Never mind that, why did you—!?"

"I, Cyhem, do not care for shitty things like feelings! Survival of the fittest—I am also one of the executives of the Monkai Association!" he announced, doing a strange pose. He then rushed towards Dulio and attempted to bite his shoulder, but he dodged it on time.

"You're fast for a dove!" shouted Cyhem. He continued his assault, biting and firing energy blasts from his mouth at Dulio—the angel kept on dodging and avoiding the stranger.

Cyhem jumped away and crossed his arms. "Why do you mourn for a terrorist? You are enemies; only the weak do such things!"

The monster's body suddenly erupted in green touki, and the area around them trembled. He grinned and charged at Dulio, who was also about to charge him when several light arrows pierced Cyhem, shocking both of them.

The one responsible for it was Griselda. The normally calm woman had some animosity radiating out of her body; it was the first time they (Brave Saints) had seen something like that coming from her. Although to Dulio, it had been a few years since he last saw such an expression on Griselda's face—the last time he saw it was when she was still teetering on the line between good and bad as an exorcist.

Griselda flew over to them with her sixteen silver and orange wings. "While I cannot excuse the things that the original Martin Bormann did, and what the soul that took over did was also unforgivable, you cannot just take a life like that; there is a process to these things."

"Ha…haa!" Cyhem laughed at her. "But…the Bastard Dragon…Emperor can? What hypocrisy! You're in his harem, so he and all of you can do…whatever you want, eh?"

Griselda summoned more light attacks all around Cyhem—they ranged from spears and swords to chainsaws and even marlin fish made of light.

"We of Team [DxD] stop those who threaten the peace that most want in this world. The supernatural has been at odds with each other for many years, and now that we have peace and normalcy, the people in it want more of it—you and the Khaos Order threaten it, so we bring you to justice."

"Not…everyone is for the peace…you idiots want; that's why we…exist to oppose you—well, some of us, but eh, it's still worth it…" said Cyhem. "A dumb slut like you wouldn't—"

The light attacks that were around him suddenly stabbed him around the body. The other [Brave Saints] looked away and didn't try to stop Griselda. Dulio walked over to Martin's corpse and carried it with him.

"Jin-kun can probably restore his body, right? I'd like to at least have him buried at a proper cemetery," said Dulio.

"Some may not agree with you, Dulio. Even if WE know the truth, others won't and—"

Dulio stopped Diethelm with his hand. "I know, but I don't care. Maybe this is me just being selfish, but as long as I can lay to rest that lost soul—that's all that matters."

Diethelm only wanted to look out for his fellow angel, but since Dulio was a special case, he decided to let him do what he wanted. He looked at Griselda, and both agreed to do that. Dulio walked away from the spot, leaving those two and the corpse of Cyhem there.

"Shall we dispose of it? Jin-kun may be interested in his body composition or not, but…" asked Diethelm. He looked back at Griselda, who was already speaking into her transceiver. After a few seconds, she nodded and turned back to face him.

"I will store him inside my ring and bring him back with us, but for now we should split up and help defeat the army that Adolf Hitler brought over," she said, and he agreed. The few [Brave Saints] around him heard this, and they began flying away.

— ○ ● ○ —

Rias Gremory and her team fought against the man himself—Adolf Hitler. Hitler had many subordinates at his disposal, so he threw them at [Team Rias Gremory] in hopes of slowing them down.

While the team dealt with them, Rias herself and Xenovia confronted Hitler themselves. A small fight had broken out between them, and Xenovia had been asking him several questions about various topics.

"So you're saying you didn't kill yourself!?" Xenovia asked, slamming her [Durandal] into another body that Hitler threw at her.

"What kind of coward would do that? I escaped after summoning a devil inside that bunker. I made a small deal with them to get out, although they betrayed me in the end and killed me. Do you ever wonder why my body was never found? Or at least revealed to the public? Because that's what happened!" he shouted happily and began laughing.

The ones who heard this were shocked, except for Vasco Strada and Crom Cruach. They simply gave them strange looks while Vasco rubbed his chin.

"Hmm. I personally went to that bunker after it was cleared by the allies and saw some strange markers that were tampered with—I believe they looked like a magic circle drawn by blood. Who would have thought that you would resort to the occult as a last resort," said the old man.

Hitler smiled at Vasco Strada and played with his moustache. "Those were indeed blood drawn by blood. Although it wasn't my blood but my wife's—I put a bullet through her head. I once read about summoning rituals and decided to use it as a last resort, and to my surprise, it worked!"

"I left through that magic circle and lived for a few more days before that specific devil heard of the results of the war and killed me. Even after I cursed him to death, he laughed at me. Well, it was better than nothing. But I got resurrected, and unfortunately that devil was long dead; I believe he was part of the Astaroth clan?" he mused while creating magic circles behind himself.

From them came out large white spirits; one had some kind of pyramid head, the other was bald and had an eye in the middle of its face. The one with the pyramid head had a large club with cursed spikes on it, while the bald spirit had no lower half; it had long hands with sharp nails at the ends of them and razor-sharp teeth.

Smaller flies and insects like frogs, wasps, and bees also began to appear everywhere, and Hitler's own hands began to glow. His left turned dark green and his right turned dark purple; his eyes turned dark, and his pupils turned yellow with a soft glow.

"If the army I have runs out, I have these, quite an interesting power I received after death. It was only amplified by the Khaos Order, which was quite a bonus. Ah, yes, after I conquer Germany, my next target is the Underworld, and yes, it's because of that singular devil."

"You're insane," Xenovia said while donning her Sacred Gear's Balance Breaker again.

"I am quite sane. As I said earlier, it's to get revenge on the allies and also relieve my glory days, and with magic it will become very much achievable. I have my own army too, and I have an infinite supply of magic because I'm using man kidnapped people I took over the year."

"You can thank the Khaos Order for that—converting life force to magic is quite an interesting feat." He showed an image of a room filled with people screaming and suffering as wires are attached to them, feeding a small circular ball. "That's connected to me and gives me unlimited magic, fufu. However, my own unique magic circles I made already make the consumption very low; this is just…safety measures."

Before Hitler could continue, Asia appeared and smashed her fist into the side of his face, breaking a few cheek bones and flinging him into the ground, a great distance away. She also punched the pyramid monster and kicked the bald-headed monster to the ground.

A look of anger stretched across her face. She didn't like what she was hearing; as someone who hated violence and wanted to resolve many things peacefully, she had been forced to change her stance on things over the year, but she accepted it since it was the only way some of those groups she faced wanted to do things.

But once she heard the things Hitler said, the ever-kind Asia lost herself in anger. This had only happened once before, and it was during the 100 years they spent in Aaron's [Pocket Dimension]. To many, it was a strange sight, but at the time, it was justifiable, and even now, those who witnessed it didn't admonish her.

"Why…why do people like you ever only think of using people as a means to an end? Are the selfish things you do that important that you can sacrifice hundreds—millions—without feeling any remorse!?" she asked, furious as tears streamed down her face.

The bald monster quickly got up and flew over to Hitler. It then put its hand towards his cheek and healed it. Adolf Hitler touched his cheek a few more times and sighed. He then looked up at Asia and felt pity for her.

"Little girl, your views on the world are too limited; why not think logically for once?" Hitler put his right hand over his heart and raised his left. "If I united everyone under my rule, I could eliminate so many things like poverty and other crises that the world has right now. I could also get rid of troublesome groups along with the Khaos Order. Can't you see that we're doing the right thing? The only one getting in our way is the Middleman—the Outer God."

"Tell me, what good has he done? Because of him getting in our way, that war that occurred a few months ago happened. If he didn't come to be—if he didn't get in our way, we would already have accomplished our goals and have true unity!" exclaimed Adolf Hitler.

[…The hell is he talking about?] Crom Cruach asked.

"Fufu, he's simply insane, Crom. So don't listen to him that much," said Akeno, reassuring the dragon, who nodded back.

Rias sighed and pointed at Hitler. "And you fail to keep up with what's happening in the human world. Jin has created two miracles for humans; one of them eliminated cancer and other diseases, and he gave certain scientists and researchers the answer to the cure for other ailments."

"The other, well, you can see it for yourself, can't you? You have magic, don't you? Manmade pollution and disasters began to rapidly heal after Christmas; certain extinct or endangered species were brought back and now are being held in captivity so that their numbers may grow larger. Nearly all types of crops can grow in any environment, even in the North and South Poles, regardless of other factors."

"To some, this may seem inconsequential or mundane, but for humans, especially in third world countries, it helps them a lot—and his company that he plans on growing, he'll provide jumps for the less fortunate so they can live comfortably. From the sounds of your 'utopia', there will still be slaves if they're not part of your 'perfect' race, would they not?" asked Rias.

Hitler laughed and covered his face, then looked back at Rias. "Of course there will be slaves! If they do not look like my perfect world, they deserve even less! The world that is equal? It seems more like a dream of a child to me—the Outer God is a fool for thinking like that!"

Hitler ordered his swarms of insects to attack the team, and the other magicians also began firing magic attacks at everyone.

A vast darkness covered the area they were in, and many of the insects were swallowed up by the darkness and killed. At the center of this darkness was Gasper in his Balance Breaker.

"<<Please leave those weaker ones to me and focus on the others,>>" Gasper told his group. Suddenly, a rain of light swords killed even more and dispelled some of Gasper's darkness. Above them was Irina, who had rejoined them with Ahin.

"Phew! Sorry for the delay, I came across some weird monster that wouldn't stop talking about a lab and a giant beetle that's stronger than a gorilla!" Irina explained, confusing everyone.

"Hmm, so you defeated those guys, huh? Angels are interesting; I'd like to experiment on some," muttered Hitler. He then looked at the pyramid-headed monster and ordered it to attack them. "Dimler, kill them."

The monster nodded before jumping towards Akeno, who was busy launching [Holy Lightning Dragons] around the other opponents. She turned to it and was about to attack it when Vasco Strada stopped it.

"Will you leave this to me, young Akeno?" he asked.

"Please and thank you, Your Eminence~" she replied before Vasco Strada slammed his [Holy Fist] Dimler's side, knocking him away.

"Huuu, don't leave me behind, Irina-chi!" Lint Sellzen shouted, following after the angel.

Lint had been at a different spot, as she had been asked by Dulio earlier to help the other angels since the [Brave Saints] would be split up all over the country. Rias agreed, and since the fighting around the country was slowly decreasing, she finally left that location and joined up with her team.

"Oh! It's Hitolar! (Hitler) Yahoo!" Lint waved to the man, confusing everyone before she fired her own light attacks towards him, but they only ended up being blocked by the bald ghost. Lint shrugged her shoulders. "I ain't using that until the main stage, so I guess I can't fight him."

"Former Prez, can I fight him with you?" Xenovia asked while floating beside Rias.

"I don't see why not?" she said, looking at Asia, who shook her head. "It seems like Asia won't participate; she has complicated feelings about this, but it's safe to say she may break her own principles and values if she took part."

Xenovia and Rias flew towards Hitler, with Xenovia in the front. After she used [Step], she propelled herself toward the man and swung her sword down. Hitler dodged it, barely, but still received some cuts on her left side.

He clicked his tongue in annoyance before dodging the balls of demonic attacks that Rias was firing at him. He retaliated by firing his own magic attacks as well as mixing in dark green and dark purple balls of energy at her. Rias used her [Power of Destruction] and countered them. When both attacks collided, they were destroyed by Rias, but a small distortion occurred where the impact happened, which piqued Rias' interest.

Xenovia continued her assault on the man, who kept using his powers on his hands to deflect some attacks, while the white ghost helped defend against her attack too and healed Hitler at the same time. Rias watched from a distance to see what kind of power Hitler had with those glowing hands of his.

'Xenovia, can you force him to use that dark green hand of his for a while?' she asked her telepathically.

'Roger!' replied the [Knight] and her power and speed increased. Xenovia specifically aimed at areas that would force Hitler to defend with his left hand, which had dark green energy.

After a few seconds, Rias came to a conclusion and asked Xenovia to focus on his right side and force him to use his right hand for the dark purple energy. After another few seconds of watching Hitler defend and heal against Xenovia's attacks, Rias had an idea of the two powers that Hitler used.

"That's fine for now, Xenovia; come back," she said, and Xenovia backed away from him. "It seems like the dark green has some kind of corrosive power, while the dark purple poisons you. Because we're immune to poisons, it didn't affect you, but it had the same feeling."

"As expected of a noble devil, to be able to discern my abilities in such a short time is quite impressive. If only I didn't hate you, I'd add you to my future concubine," Hitler said with a smirk.

"I'd rather die than be part of your concubine, Hitler. However, may you tell us what those summons are?" she asked, knowing full well he wouldn't, but to her surprise, he did.

Hitler shrugged and looked at the bald monster behind him. "They're nothing special. It's not even an ability of mine except for the insects; those two you saw me 'summon' are actually Divine Beasts I specifically asked for. I do have one more—but the one that's fighting Vasco Strada is my 'offense', and this one here is called Cherry, and she's mostly used for support and utility."

Rias nodded, still surprised that Hitler would tell them about his beasts, although he didn't tell them how to defeat them or any of their weaknesses. Now they know that they're Divine Beast, albeit a bit more unique than the normal ones.

Hitler aimed both his fingers at Xenovia and Rias and began firing bullet-shaped attacks at them with both of his corrosive and poison powers. Rias enveloped her body with her [Power of Destruction] while Xenovia blocked the ones aimed at her with a magic circle. However, she noticed that the dark green energy began to dissolve her magic circle, surprising them both.

"Surprised? It's quite powerful because it can dissolve even magic, regardless of who's stronger between us." Hitler smirked again before increasing the number of bullets sprayed at both of them, forcing Xenovia to fly away and avoid them. Rias was safe, as her clan's trait exceeded it.

Suddenly, a giant slash flew towards Hitler; he jumped away but barely avoided it. His right arm was cut off during it, forcing Cherry to grab the severed arm, hold it up to the stump, and reattach it.

Hitler formed small bee-like creatures with his dark green aura and sent them towards Xenovia, while he formed his dark purple energy into a humanoid and sent it to Rias. In the meantime, a large magic circle appeared behind him.

'Is he going to summon his last Divine Beast? I should prevent him from doing that—or should I let him and then destroy it?' Rias thought while avoiding the humanoid dark purple energy's attacks.

As the heiress to the Gremory clan was about to fire several shots of [Power of Destruction] at the man, the dark purple humanoid multiplied and began relentlessly attacking her aura, destroying themselves. Even after being destroyed, the original kept multiplying itself. To Rias, it seemed like they had begun a random suicide charge; upon closer inspection, she saw that they were simply buying time for Hitler to summon the last Divine Beast.

She immediately created an even larger ball of destruction and wiped out the clones and originals before firing a single but enormous [Extinguished Star] at Hitler. The attack seemed to have hit him, as it created a powerful explosion.

The bee-like creatures that were attacking Xenovia also disappeared, indicating that she had won, but she still felt his energy there, so she fired another shot of [Extinguished Star], but as the smoke cleared, a large hand blocked the attack briefly before being destroyed, but it also instantly regenerated.

A large, wooden-like monster stood behind Hitler. It was larger than Cherry, as it had a body made out of wood, several branch-like protrusions coming out of its head and arms, baggy black pants, and an O-shaped marking in the middle of its stomach. It had two red bracelets on its wrists and rectangular teeth that rattled every few seconds. Its eyes were the shape of the swastika and occasionally spun.

"Aitnaurd—the living and moving 'World Tree'. We were able to sneak into Asgard and analyze the World Tree and make a living replica of it, albeit a lot weaker. It was during when Ms. Lapis was with us. However, due to somebody's interference, research was cut short, and this is what we were left with. A new type of Divine Beast, you could say."

'A third generation, or is it a fourth? Even if it's not the complete form they were looking for, it's still quite something. To be able to replicate something close to the Yggdrasil…those scientists are dangerous even after Aaron cut off communications with the Phantasma, Evie, and the rest of the Khaos Order,' Rias thought as she stared at the Divine Beast.

Rias created hundreds of small balls of destruction before firing them towards Hitler and Aitnaurd. A large wooden shield appeared around them with strange symbols; however, it only blocked a few attacks before being destroyed.

Hitler himself only suffered minor damage, while Aitnaurd took the brunt of it and Cherry took on the rest; both healed each other, and then Hitler smiled at Rias.

"Former Prez, I think Hitler is telling us to kill him since capturing him may be impossible. We also don't know if he'll change his mind about suicide if he knows he'll be captured, so I believe he'll only accept one way of losing—being killed," said Xenovia as she floated beside her [King].

Apart from the alliance and the other leaders, Aaron had no need for any of them to live—it was only because the leaders asked him to capture some of the important figures that he wasn't asking his comrades to just outright kill them.

"Xenovia, play with them for a bit, but be careful. I'll speak with Aaron about this," Rias told her, and Xenovia immediately charged towards them.

[Aaron?]

[Hmm? Rias, did you need something?]

[So—] Rias explained their situation and asked for his thoughts.

[Just kill him. Suzaku did something similar to someone here; I'm just going to resurrect them and seal their powers. The alliance shouldn't have any problems with that—although I'll take away those powers of his instead of just sealing it,] he told her.

[I see, thank you.] Rias looked back at the scene and found Xenovia was dual-wielding [Excalibur] and [Durandal].

Xenovia used [Durandal] to deal with Cherry, while she used Excalibur on Aitnaurd. Hitler was already knocked away from them, so the [Knight] could focus on the two Divine Beasts first. She threw up [Durandal] before slashing [Excalibur] at Aitnaurd.

The Wooden Divine Beast's chest was slashed open, but an eye was looking back at Xenovia from within its chest. The eye opened and barred its teeth before screeching and firing a blast of green energy at Xenovia, who blocked it with [Excalibur]. It kept pushing her back until she redirected it to the sky, and it exploded.

"We can kill him," Rias told Xenovia. "You don't need to hold back anymore, Xenovia."

Xenovia grinned before increasing her power even further. She dismissed [Excalibur] and grabbed the suspended [Durandal] in the air; she then dove down and sliced Cherry in half, along with the ground beneath them.

Germany—the country had been sliced in half. She quickly sliced Cherry up into more pieces while applying [Anti-healing] and [Anti-regeneration] to her sword to prevent her from being healed.

She flew towards Aitnaurd, who created several wooden wheels and ignited them with green flames before throwing them at Xenovia. The blue-haired woman brought her sword back and swung it down, creating a blade aura of destruction that cut the attack apart and destroyed the area around Aitnaurd.

Xenovia purposely missed him before jumping towards him and slicing him in half (horizontally). Aitnaurd couldn't regenerate and tried to grab Xenovia, but as she was still in her Balance Breaker, sharp hands came out of her back and tore Aitnaurd's hands apart, surprising them all.

"You can do that!?" she asked in shock.

[~~!]

Hitler panicked and began to fire his dark purple and green attacks at Xenovia, but using her superior speed, she dashed towards him, cutting off his arms. Hitler screamed, but Xenovia charged back to Aitnaurd before slicing him into more pieces—killing the Divine Beast.

"Prez!" she shouted as Rias landed beside her.

"Good work." Rias patted Xenovia on the shoulder before walking over to Hitler, who was screaming as a pool of blood formed around him as she knelt on both his knees.

"Aaron will probably want to analyze this, right? …How do we store it?" Xenovia asked herself.

[…!]

"…Yeah, that should do it," replied Xenovia. With her beast's suggestion, she encased the corpse of Aitnaurd with a barrier and watched her [King] stand in front of Hitler.

"Any last words?" Rias asked while holding a ball of destruction in front of her.

Smirking, Hitler opened his mouth, creating a mini-magic circle, and fired an attack from it. It was immediately destroyed by the [Power of Destruction] around her body. Rias didn't react and repeated her question.

"Hmph. One day I'll be back, and when that comes, I'll plunge this world into darkness again," he said defiantly.

"And we, [DxD], will be there to stop you. It won't matter what year or what era you come back to, we'll stop you again and again," declared Rias, making Hitler laugh. She finally ended the man's life again, blasting his body away with her power.

Rias touched her transceiver and announced, [This is Rias Gremory, part of the Germany team; Hitler has been killed. The only ones left are some of his officers and a few weaker members. We will finish up soon.]

— ○ ● ○ —

"My, you're not cute at all. A walking shark? Quite grotesque if you ask me," Ennea said, her hand on her cheek and a smug grin on her face.

The monster had the upper body of a shark and the face of a shark but had human arms, hands, legs, and feet. It wore a military-style jacket tailored to fit, pants, and shoes. Upon hearing this insult from the woman in front of him, he scowled at her.

"You dare insult me, Idoperry!? I am the few shark monsters that can freely move on the surface without the need of water magic! I am a revolutionary among my species and the evolutionary path that we will take in the future!" he declared and flexed his muscles.

In the distance, in the Greek realm, various figures fought. A myriad of explosions occurred all around them, and it seemed both sides were evenly matched; however, that was not Ennea's problem…for now, so she focused on what was in front of her.

"Ido…perry? What kind of name is that?" she asked, confused by it.

Idoperry sighed. "It's not worth trying to explain the complexities of my name! I thought long and hard about it before I came up with it."

He put his hand out, summoned a water blade with a chain attached to it, and started spinning the chain in his hand. On the other end was another water blade; the longer he spun it, the longer the blade became.

Ennea, amused by it, shot a single arrow at him, but Idoperry deflected it using his water blade. Ennea could see that there was a small, dense amount of touki covering it, further amplifying its powers.

He stopped spinning it and caught the blade by its small handle before dashing towards Ennea using his touki and wind magic. Arriving in front of her, he swung the blade upward, but the woman stepped back, forcing the blade to miss. However, Idoperry smiled as the other blade began to swing towards her after the chain had wrapped around his body.

The female archer created an ethereal knife in her right hand and threw it at the water blade, forcing it upwards. With one hand, she fired a more powerful arrow towards Idoperry, forcing him to block it with his own arms, but it wasn't enough as it pierced through his defenses and knocked him away.

As Idoperry stabilized his footing on the ground, he looked up only to see a metallic knee slam into his face, knocking him further away. Ennea followed this up by firing several more arrows at the monster; several of them stabbed him through various non-fatal spots before she appeared above him and slammed her foot on his face, embedding his body in the ground.

Ennea summoned several large spears and stabbed them into his arms and legs, crucifying him to the ground like Jesus Christ.

"This…is some kind of sick joke to you?" Idoperry asked, unable to move. "I am the pinnacle of my species; kill me and—"

"I. Don't. Care~!" she told him in a sing-song-like manner while clapping her hand. She stood over him, pointing her bow at him. "You serve no purpose, really. Executive? Evolutionary? My master can make all that happen with his will—you're nothing special. Also, you're getting in the way of his goal, as well as disturbing the current peace; you deserve nothing but death~!"

She didn't wait for an answer from him and shot Idoperry in the head, ending his life.

"Time to rejoin everyone else~ Ines is probably done with her one too," she mumbled before jumping back towards the center of Little Olympia.

— ○ ● ○ —

Ines stood over a groveling bear monster. It was around 11'3" in height and was a mix of black and blue. It could harden its fur to act as an extra layer of defense, but it served no use after battling the halberd-wielding woman.

"You…never bothered with my name…" muttered the bear.

"I have no use for it; this is as far as you go," she said, and she stabbed him in the head. After killing her opponent, she looked over to the middle of Little Olympia and saw that the fight over there was also about to conclude, so she rushed back.

— ○ ● ○ —

Black Alice's clones were slowly trickling down, and as the fighting around the realm calmed down, her army decreased in size, both in this realm and out in Greece, as the teams over there were also about to finish up.

'This…is becoming bad; I should slip away,' she thought and began to slowly inch away from the place, but as she was about to turn around and teleport, Kurousagi appeared and thrust her spear towards the woman.

Black Alice was forced to block it with one of her magic circles, but Kurousagi's spear pierced through it and forced her to use her tentacles to block her attack. Again, it was futile, as her spear pierced through it. But was finally stopped after she created several more clones and had them attack the rabbit goddess.

Kurousagi spun her spear around, deflected the magic attacks sent to her, and slashed apart the tentacles that were used against her. Black Alice clicked her tongue in annoyance, but as she was about to move again, she felt a burning sensation on her back, and when she turned around, she saw she had been hit by an ice spell by Vera, another rabbit goddess.

"You filthy rabbits! I should have sent some monsters to your home towns to have them killed!" sneered Black Alice.

Golden wings sprouted from her back and healed her injuries. She then flew up and summoned golden angelic statues that began to ring around the Little Olympia.

With a sneer on her face, she said, "A little present from our Phantasma friends; it was given to me before we came back. Kusshu, please help mommy too, okay~?"

The golden angelic statues began to ring. Black Alice threw her brown teddy bear forward, and it exploded into a brown pillar. Once the pillar vanished, an enormous brown bear the size of the [Tower of Heaven] in Little Olympia. It had various tentacles around its body, from small to large, with teeth located around them. It also had eyes all over it, screeched curses occasionally, and finally had brown flames that erupted all around its body.

"Kusshu has always been my favorite teddy bear that I took from a little girl in the human world. She was quite annoying, but the little teddy bear was quite cute, so I kept him," explained Black Alice.

The brown bear roared before it attacked everything in its sight. The buildings around it began to crumble due to its presence alone; some were also crushed or destroyed because of its flames or tentacles.

[[Team Moon Rabbits] will deal with the bear; please deal with Black Alice,] Kurousagi said through their transceiver.

[I will also provide assistance to the bear,] said Elyscia.

A large icicle dome was created around the rampaging bear by Elyscia. Once it was created, it limited its movements while also preventing more damage around the town. [Team Moon Rabbits], along with a few warriors of the Greek realm and Elyscia, went inside the ice dome.

"Oh, they trapped the poor thing; well, it doesn't matter," she said, and then she looked at Zeus. "I will remind this realm of what it experienced back then."

"Stop her—!" Zeus shouted, but another powerful surge of power blew them away from Black Alice, and her body began to increase in size and morph into something grotesque.

Various grotesque tentacles and appendages appear and seem to form some kind of living being. Mouths of different shapes, sizes, and lengths began to form around Black Alice's body—fly traps, bird beaks, elephant trunks—and in the middle of all this was Black Alice's body—her upper half, which showed her stomach, breasts, and head.

"Hehehehe~ it's been a long time since I assumed this form. Well? Does it make you nostalgic, Zeus~?" she asked while giggling.

Zeus did not reply as he threw an enormous lightning bolt at her, but it was simply absorbed by her body. Everyone else did the same thing, but the only attack that Black Alice defended against was Vali's, which was his [Satan Lucifer Smasher], and even then, the damage that he did was healed rather quickly.

"Ara~? It seems like you guys can't really damage me, fufufu~" she mocked them. After that, she raised her left arm as millions of magic circles appeared all over Little Olympia.

"Vali, can you stop that?" Zeus asked.

"Heh, I'm going to try," he said confidently, facing the magic circles that were about to fire their attacks.

Black Alice smirked at them and finally brought down a rain of attacks on the town and the alliance. Vali spread his wings out and put his arm forward.

{[[LLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLucifer!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!]]}

{Satan Compression Divider!!!!!!!!!!!!}

Vali's ability managed to compress around three-quarters of Black Alice's attack, but the last quarter managed to slip through. He clicked his tongue and was preparing to use another [Satan Compression Divider], when the entire town—the entire realm—was engulfed in a blizzard. The other magic attacks were also frozen solid.

"This is…d-don't tell me," he muttered.

"Vaa-kun, you did good~" Lavinia said, hugging him from behind. "But it wasn't just me…unfortunately." Lavinia looked to their east and saw another woman in military-style clothing who grinned at them.

"…That's Yashina, right? When did she—?" he asked, but black, distorted blades of darkness appeared all around the town too, killing more of her subordinates.

"On our way here, we encountered her—apparently, she was in Greece. But everyone is here now, Vaa-kun~" she said and patted his head.

"Everyone? Then does that mean—"

"Yeah, I'm here," said Aaron, replying to Zeus' question. "We may as well end this now, eh?"

"Ara? Middleman-kun, you're here! Then please make this more entertaining for me!!" Black Alice screamed and created another million magic circles around her.

As the magic attacks rained down, Aaron held his right arm out, and a swirling silver-white vortex came out of his palm and swallowed up all the attacks. Black Alice was left speechless. She tried to create more magic circles but found that she couldn't.

"Why?! Why can't I—!? You! What did you do!?" she asked, getting more aggravated as the seconds ticked on by.

"Let's…keep the clichés to a minimum. Tell me, why did you attack this place all those years ago? Were you coerced by Nyarlathotep?" Aaron asked.

Black Alice didn't answer as she moved her tentacles to attack Aaron, but they were stopped by his [Infinity]. She continued her futile attempts to hurt him, but none of them worked. The more she slammed her tentacles against his invisible wall, the more damaged they became.

"I don't even know who that is! I only attacked this place because I heard Typhon was planning to, and I followed him. After that, well, they were all weakened, making my attack much easier!" she snickered and stopped attacking him.

"Let me tell you something, little dragon." She brought one of her tentacles to her face and licked it. "Those who are truly evil…don't know a reason to cause chaos—we don't know reasons to do things; we do them because we want to, because we felt like it!"

"Not everything that is done needs a reason. Only fools and those who conform to made-up rules do—we, the ones that cause chaos, are the freest of them all! Until you understand our way of thinking, you're nothing but a cog in the wheel of life," she said and began uncontrollably laughing.

Aaron gestured for Zeus to go beside him, and the god did.

"Seeing as Nyarlathotep was the main cause for the incident all those years ago, as well as Black Alice, I'll offer you the chance to kill her," he said. Zeus began to say something when Aaron interrupted him. "We don't need anything from her; I already 'extracted' the information from her."

Zeus silently agreed. Aaron created a bolt of lightning in front of Zeus and handed it to him; the Chief-God of his pantheon took it from him without a word and looked at Black Alice, who simply grinned back at the god. She tried to attack him, but none of the attacks reached them. Nevertheless, she continued.

"…I had many speeches prepared for when this time came, but…now that it's finally here, I can't say any of them, but…" Zeus looked at the monster in front of him with so much animosity that it made the area silent; it almost seemed like the look he gave her had an effect on reality. "This is for my unborn child."

Zeus threw the lightning bolt towards Black Alice; the sound crackled in the air before it struck her. For a few seconds, it looked like it didn't affect her, but then the screams started and she began to violently convulse. Lightning surged from within her body before it exploded!

Aaron prevented the blood and guts from spilling everywhere by catching them and condensing them into a small pill. When he looked at Zeus, the man looked exhausted, but it also seemed like a huge burden had been taken off his chest.

Looking back at the ice dome, he saw that the brown bear had also been subdued. He then looked around his allies and raised his hand before closing it—killing the rest of the fodder and capturing the rest, which included Greece, Asgard, and Germany.

[I declare this operation over,] he said and sighed.

The long fighting had finally ended.

— ○ ● ○ —

Aaron Toole's Soliloquy

— ○ ● ○ —

A few hours had passed after the fighting. I had gone around the two countries and pantheons to repair the damage that had been done. Apart from fixing things, I also checked on some of the places that I had previously been and resurrected some people that were killed.

Currently, I am still in the Greek realm but am checking up on the elf's home. Their Queen, Amaryllis Ismene, was insistent on meeting me. I wanted some surprises, so I didn't 'look' into it, but Auna did mention that it would be 'shocking' to me, whatever that meant.

The one who's with me right now is Yashina. She didn't want to bother with helping the alliance clean up, nor would she take no for an answer. She would only listen to me but also insist on accompanying me, so this was our situation.

Lavinia had gone with Vali, and the others were spread out around the countries and pantheons, keeping an eye out for anything or anyone suspicious. Even after I offered to, they wanted to feel like they were doing their job, so I let them.

Velgrynd stayed behind with Rossweisse in Asgard; the other girls went to various other places as they wanted to visit the country or pantheon. The gods went back to deal with the fallout and inform their citizens, and the warriors that were injured were healed by me earlier, and many of them were not helping with the aftermath.

"Interesting place. A bit too green for my liking though," said Yashina.

"Elves live like this; it's nothing strange," I told her.

We finally arrived at the platform and were taken to the underground portion of the territory, and we quickly made our way to her chambers by teleporting to the gate. Once there, I pushed the door open and was greeted by an injured Nienna (dark elf and guard of the queen) and Amaryllis herself, which surprised me a bit.

"Middleman, I'm glad you could—" Ignoring her pleasantries or whatever she wanted to say, I went over to her and healed their injuries. Looking around, there were even more elves that had sustained injuries, so I healed them too.

As I did this, I felt a few more life energies that I was familiar with, and I planned on going to them after this.

"Amaryllis, what did you need me for? Also, I would have liked it more if you asked for help in that regard; my subordinate was here earlier, was she not?" I asked and pointed at her body, which previously had various injuries.

"Ah-ahahah-hohoho! Do not worry, Middleman-sama! I'm glad you worried for us, but when dangerous events like that take place, we activate the enormous magic circle we have drawn around our territory—it acts like a healing spot. It's not as potent as the Phenex Tears, your Slime Pills, or even [Twilight Healing] or [Holy Resuscitation]," she explained, nervously scratching her cheek.

She didn't look like a Queen at all right now; she looked more like a kid caught doing something bad by her parents. Although, a healing circle, huh? Looking at the ground, I felt a lot of magic coming out of it, and checking further aboveground, I saw that it definitely affected them.

"Is that so? Then, what did you need me for? I repaired the realm earlier and plan on doing more here, like erecting another barrier, but did you need me for anything specific?" I asked again. When I glanced at Yashina, she was smugly glaring at Nienna, who glared back at her as well.

I wonder what their deal is?

'Ddraig would say something witty right now, but they're still in Germany, right?' Rudra asked.

'Yeah, they are. I dunno why, though; they never explained, and the Rias' team wouldn't elaborate.'

'Hmm. They're trusting you that you won't look into it, right?'

'Heh, well, they probably are.'

After my quick conversation with Rudra, I looked back at the Queen, who was fidgeting in her seat. When I looked at Nienna, she looked at me with a troubled expression, and the other elves looked tired too.

If she—

"P-please, hear me out! I really need to be impregnated!" she yelled. I immediately grabbed Yashina's wrist, preventing the woman from charging forward and attacking the Queen, who looked mortified at her icy glare.

"Hmph. The one who'll be pregnant first is me!" she declared, her voice echoing in the throne room.

[Aaron! Aaron! Something just felt off. Did Yashina do something to you!?] Lavinia asked through the ring's transceiver.

'…Her intuition is next level, Aaron,' commented Rudra.

'Tell me about it…although this will extend to our children in the future, I think it's a good thing,' I told him, making him chuckle.

[I'm coming now! Vaa-kun, I have to leave!] Lavinia yelled, and seconds later, a magic circle appeared, and out came the woman. "Who—you!!" she shouted and pointed at Yashina.

Everyone was stunned by this sudden spectacle. But I calmly explained to Lavinia what happened, and she sighed, shook her head, and just hugged my arm. Glaring between the Queen and Yashina, she mumbled, 'I'll be pregnant first; it was a promise; it was a deal'.

Truthfully, I never told her or anyone else who would get pregnant first, so right now they have no idea. But as Rudra said, her intuition is strangely accurate about everyday life, so…

"Anyway, we'll get going, but I won't impregnate you, Amaryllis. I told you months ago that we can start as friends, but I won't just impregnate you for the sake of it, because that child would also be mine, and I'd like to be part of their life and not be a deadbeat dad," I told her and turned around. "We'll get going then!"

— ○ ● ○ —

"Let go."

"No."

"You're not in Aaron's harem."

"I do not care, also, who's Aaron?"

"Aaron is Aaron; if you don't know who Aaron is, you're not worthy."

"I was joking; I know who it is."

"You're bad with jokes."

As we took the elevator up to the surface, Lavinia and Yashina were at odds with each other. Lavinia hugged my left arm, while Yashina did it to my right arm. Whether or not she did it because she likes me or if she just wanted to antagonize Lavinia, I wasn't sure.

"Come on, behave, you two," I chided them, and they both turned away from each other as we finally reached the surface.

Once there, we went to the middle where the pillars were and found Rena with a few other elves; they seemed to have congregated there as it seemed to be the strongest area to heal. They didn't notice us, so we went up to them.

"It seems a bit slow," I muttered, forcing Rena to open her eyes and look up at me. She had a large cut across her forehead, a black eye, and several cuts and bruises around her body.

"…Ah, Middleman-sama…"

Before she could say anything else, I put my hand up and created the same magic circle above the territory and healed them. They noticed their injuries quickly healing, and even more had their missing limbs grow back, surprising them.

'Auna, did you heal any of these guys before you left?' I asked her telepathically.

'The elves of the Greek realm? I did, although I left after Artemis and I defeated the [Next Doll] that came, as the Sirens needed help, as well as other smaller settlements,' she explained.

This may have been the result of more fighting after she left them. I would have liked it if she kept a clone, though…well, whatever, hindsight is twenty-twenty. 'Alright, I was just making sure.'

"Thank you, Middleman-sama," she said and bowed.

"Call me Jin," I told her, and I waved them off. Most of them muttered a 'thank you' before scurrying off.

"T-then Jin-sama, thank you. Did this affect the entire territory? I believe Artemis-sama has even worse injuries than us as she and that Auna woman fought that giant robot from earlier. After they defeated it, she kept fighting even with her injuries." Rena looked in a certain direction, and I looked towards it too.

"She's at the shooting range? What kind of—never mind, I'll go there, thanks," I told her and left with the other two.

As we walked towards the spot, Lavinia asked, "That's where you had your archery competition, right?"

"Yeah, and I won—we had subsequent competitions in 'that' place, and I won them all—well, except for one where you interrupted us, so it was inconclusive." When I looked at Lavinia, she was blushing.

"Ha-ha-ha! Interrupting a competition, how spoiled is your 'Ice Queen', Jin?" Yashina asked, smirking at Lavinia.

Lavinia's embarrassment vanished instantly as she glared back at Yashina, and the two stared each other down. This silence continued until we reached the range and found Artemis removing some of the bandages from her body after I healed everyone.

I quickly left the two and stood in front of her, surprising her a little. She stared at me and sighed before averting her eyes from me.

"So, you're just going to ignore me? I'm hurt, Artemis; we've been through so much," I said, trying to lighten the mood.

"You've already healed all of the injuries here, right? Go to the other prominent towns and smaller settlements and help them; I'm fine—"

I grabbed her right arm, which she kept hiding, and found that she was missing her index and middle fingers. Upon closer inspection, some strange anti-healing spell was targeted at it. Perhaps the [Next Doll] they faced aimed for it since Artemis is an archer? Crippling her at specific appendages would certainly be beneficial for them. Or another opponent after Auna left; I'm not sure. Either way, I'll help her.

She looked uncomfortable, but I quickly restored them, and she sighed even more.

"I am a goddess; I could have lived without it, or at least I could have gone to Grigori because of the alliance and gotten mechanical ones," she told me while pulling her hand away.

Even though she said that, the look of relief on her face said it all, but I decided not to comment on that and just nodded. Further inspecting her body, I found a few more spots that were hit by some kind of anti-healing spell. Her body briefly glowed before she was back to full strength.

"What did this to you? You're quite powerful, you know? Did you let your guard down, or did they use something—"

"I underestimated them, and I was tired. Even though I knew this operation was coming, I was busy with other things and didn't get enough sleep. And…I had other things on my mind, and I was paying too close attention during my fights; that's it…" she said in frustration.

Things in her mind, huh? Well, Astraea did ask me to talk to her; I may as well do it now.

"Do you mind telling me about it?" I asked.

"Yes, I do mind," she snapped back, but it wasn't in a hostile way—it was almost like she was embarrassed.

We fell into silence for a minute before she squirmed a bit and sighed again. She looked back at me, glaring (cutely), and said, "…After my loss in the match against Aurelia's team, Rossweisse said something to me before I left the field, and so did Athena after I came back here before my team."

She looked uncomfortable, so she stayed silent for a few seconds. "…Athena said that I should thank you. I already told her I did, but she said that I should do something for you, l-like cook you something."

I tilted my head. "Cook me something…? Thank me? What are you talking about? I haven't done anything to you lately for you to thank me in any way, Artemis."

She put her hands on her face and sighed even deeper while muttering something to herself. "…Look, let me repay you, okay? I think Athena meant it for when you brought her back to her original self—before the brainwashing. She also wants to repay you, so look out for that."

Shrugging my shoulders, I agreed. "I ain't gonna stop you if that's how you feel; come by my home any time you like and you can cook there since we have the ingredients and utensils for an easier cooking experience! …I feel like I'm advertising my home for something."

Artemis chuckled at that and got up. "How about another archery competition? The same rules from when we first met."

"Gets her fingers back and immediately challenges me; yeah, that's definitely like you." I nodded my head sagely and agreed. We walked over to the range as Lavinia and Yashina joined us.

Apparently, Lavinia had held Yashina back and put her hand over her mouth so as not to interrupt us. I'm thankful that she did; otherwise, I feel like Yashina would have tried to interject during our conversation.

Artemis set up the targets like last time and brought out her bow, as did I. She went first and hit all the bullseyes. I did the same thing, and this went on for the first few rounds until we arrived at the last one. It was clear that she was nervous, but from what?

Maybe she felt some pressure because this was our second time competing here. The spot where it all started.

She took aim, and her first two shots hit the bullseye. Her breathing began to become ragged as she aimed her last arrow, and she released. It silently flew through the air and finally hit the target. She held her breath as we inspected it.

"…This feels like déjà vu," I muttered. The arrow had struck a spot just outside of the bullseye, meaning she did the same thing as last time.

Artemis visibly gulped but stepped away. I stood on the spot and fired my first two arrows, and they hit the bullseye. For my last one, I peeked at Artemis, who was staring at me, unblinking, with a strange sense of wonder in her eyes as if waiting for something.

Finally, I looked back at the target. I had planned on missing too, but she was staring at me so much that she would definitely know I purposely missed, so…I released my arrow, and it flew through the air and smacked into the bullseye, earning me the win in the short competition.

"Looks like I win again; déjà vu all over again," I said, but Artemis didn't say anything.

She walked up to me, looked back at the targets, then up at me. "Like back then, we can do or request anything from the loser. What do you want?" she asked, but this time the hostility wasn't present.

Even though it's only been a few months since we met (not including our time in my dimension), she's really softened up.

After all that had happened today, I wanted to lighten the mood since a lot of people were exhausted both physically and mentally, so I grinned at her and said, "Well, a kiss on the cheek wouldn't be bad!" I then laughed. "I'm jok—"

Artemis got on her tiptoes and kissed me on the cheek, blushing furiously while doing so. This left me stunned because I didn't think she would do it. Both Lavinia and Yashina reacted a few meters away; Lavinia giggled while Yashina snickered at the goddess.

"Is that fine?" she asked vehemently, still red as a tomato.

"Yeah, it is, thanks," I replied, a bit confused but liking it. "Well…take care. I'm looking forward to your visit with Athena."

As I walked away, Artemis asked, "I-is there any dish you want to particularly taste?"

I stopped and turned back to look at her. With a finger under my chin, I said, "Homemade Moussaka would be a nice treat. I've been meaning to make it."

The national dish of Greece, Moussaka, is regarded as the most famous Greek food in the country. The iconic dish oozes with Greek flavor. It combines layers of fried eggplant, potatoes, seasoned ground meat, and spiced tomato sauce, then is topped with a creamy béchamel sauce.

As one of the most popular traditional Greek dishes, Moussaka is not only available at most tavernas and restaurants in Greece, but it also appears on Greek food menus around the world. It's so famous that it doesn't even have a translation. Keeping up with the times, vegetarian versions of Moussaka are becoming increasingly popular, especially in larger cities like Athens.

Because of that, I wanted to try a homemade one; it made me wonder how well it would be made by the Greek gods or goddesses themselves.

Artemis seemed to ponder the thought before she nodded. "Athena and I will make one each when we visit; please be ready. Maybe someone else may join us, if you're fine with that?"

"The more the merrier! Bring 'em all! See you then!" I said and waved at her before joining Yashina and Lavinia. I'm looking forward to it—homemade Moussaka, huh? Maybe I should add that to my restaurant's menu...

"Another goddess…" Lavinia muttered.

She was strangely happy about it, although I did see her and Artemis chatting a handful of times during our 100 years together, and they seemed to enjoy each other's company. So her being happy wasn't that strange.

"Again? So you've already conquered some goddess? Heh, this makes it a good challenge for me—I'll make you fall, Skyward," Yashina said, determination flowing from her body.

— ○ ● ○ —

Arriving back in Little Olympia, we immediately went towards the [Tower of Heaven] and saw Hermes there with a few other people; the town had gone back to normal, kind of. The attack had happened a few hours ago, but this was still quite impressive.

"Hmm? Oh, Jin-kun, good timing. Kuro-kun and Vera-kun are looking for you in the rabbit village; they want you to build a little wall for their village with a fit bits and bobs," said Hermes as we arrived by him.

Looking at some of the other places I need to go back to, I can spare some time, so I agreed.

— ○ ● ○ —

Upon arriving there, the place was a lot better off than the other places I visited. Earlier, I skipped it since Kuro and Vera were going there. I always wondered why they didn't ask me to put defenses around here; although it is quite far from the other settlements, certain gods and goddesses still frequently visit it.

"Hmm? Jin and Lavinia with…a terrorist? Why are you here?" Amalthea's voice asked. We turned around to see the goddess and Zeus' mother there.

The fact that Amalthea just referred to Yashina as a terrorist is strangely amusing to me. The woman herself didn't react and just looked at Amalthea with a confused look.

"Yeah, Hermes said that Kurousagi and Vera were looking for me. They wanted me to make some defenses here," I replied.

She clapped her hands before grabbing mine and dragging me away. Lavinia clung on for dear life while Yashina let go and followed us from behind, which was surprising.

"Yes, they did inform me of that a few minutes ago. We were going to contact you but decided to inform Hermes instead since you were probably busy inspecting the rest of the realm," she said. "Since I was part of this planning, I can tell you a bit about the defense they'd like."

She told us, and it was quite simple. They wanted these unique walls that, if you looked from the outside, looked like normal walls, but if you were inside the village, you would see the outside as if the walls were transparent or like they were made of glass.

They didn't want a roof above it, but they did want a barrier that was dome-shaped but still let rain and other elements through. Finally, they wanted some more facilities here, as there was too much open space that wasn't used for anything.

I would need to move certain buildings and structures to accommodate them, like the field for growing vegetables, which will be in a greenhouse instead of just being outside.

We made our way to Rini's home and went inside without knocking; once inside, we saw the usual suspects: Vera, Kuro, and Rini herself.

"Aaron-sama!" Kuro shouted before rushing over to me and hugging me.

I patted her on the head and said, "So you guys needed me for some construction work? This place was hit the lowest because of its location and my shadow soldiers defending everyone."

"I also helped," Amalthea said proudly.

She wasn't in Little Olympia, and I assumed she was somewhere else, although my first thought was that she was in Mount Olympus since she wasn't a fighter in my eyes, but it did look like she was competent in defensive magic…maybe…

"Yeah, thank you," I told her, and I attempted to pet her head, but she stopped my hand and just held it.

"So, where do you want me to start?" I asked.

"There were a few homes destroyed during the attack, so we'd like to make those for the residents first if you don't mind," Vera said, and I agreed.

We quickly left the home, with them guiding me to locations they wanted the new stand-alone homes or some large apartment complexes to be built at. I asked the other rabbit youkai, and they had requested the apartment building. Some didn't want to bother with gardening, while others did, so an apartment was their solution with a shared front and back yard where they could choose to garden or not.

There was also a small local community swimming pool built for it and a gym that was inside the building that I made. I guess everyone here wanted to become stronger because of the attack. While this was a lot less destructive than the attack from years ago, it left some traumatized or helpless, and they now want to get stronger.

Once those two things were made, I created the necessary equipment too, and when that was done, the youth and many of the young adults flocked to the place; even with the small community, they were quite eager.

Next was moving the farms that they had. We walked over to the spot where they wanted the greenhouse to be built. It was near where Kurousagi had been training before we got to speak to each other for the first time.

"This seems a bit nostalgic. Remember when you were so hostile towards me?" I asked Kuro as I began to build the structure.

She blushed, and her ears flopped down, but she agreed. "W-well, I had my reasons to be distrustful of people…" she mumbled.

"Right~? You have no idea how much I had to do to track you down and then try to beat you in the Tournament of Power! So stubborn!" Vera crossed her arms and turned away.

"Uwaaaa! What are you doing, miss!?" Rini shouted, sounding panicked. When we turned around, we saw Yashina had erected an ice statue of me in the middle of the town; she ignored Rini and just laughed.

"Isn't it appropriate? The hero of the supernatural has a dedicated statue here?" she asked and kept laughing.

Rini was left thunderstruck, and the other rabbit youkai who were around approved of the thing she had made. She turned to look at us and gave us a thumbs up. Lavinia and I didn't know how to react to this, but they seemed fine with it, so I'll leave it to them to deal with.

I quickly finished up the construction of the greenhouse, helped move everything in there, and then started on the wall that would cover the place and a bit beyond it since it was mostly uninhabited territory.

There were also a few watch tower arrows that would shoot at anyone that was seen as part of the Khaos Order. The recognition software was connected back to the base for [EXE] in my compound under my home in the Dimensional Gap. The ones constantly updating it are the members of [EXE], along with Cúntóir, Azathoth, Latia, and me.

There were also platforms in the tower where the guards could stay, and it was relatively comfortable. A couch, TV, air conditioner, fridge, food, and CCTV that showed various points of the wall, so they could see everywhere 99% of the time.

The last part was adding the barrier around their village, which was done swiftly. Finally done with this, we went back to Rini's home to have a bite to eat. The ones who insisted on cooking were Amalthea and Rini, so the rest of us just sat back. I was on the couch with Lavinia sitting on my lap, cuddling up to me, and Kurousagi on my left side.

Vera was trying to lecture Yashina, who didn't really listen to her as she had grabbed a book at Rini's house and read it.

As we waited, Kurousagi asked, "The end of the preliminary stages is coming soon; may I ask what kind of rule sets are in the main stage?"

The one who answered her question was Lavinia.

"It's quite straightforward. It's just a normal Rating Game with no special rules—well, maybe there might be special rules depending on the field that's used," she explained.

Kuro nodded. "So, the teams that managed to get up there relying on certain rulesets may have a hard time then?" she asked.

"Yes. Teams that lack power will definitely be knocked out in the main stage of the tournament," replied Lavinia.

Kurousagi and Vera's [Team Moon Rabbits] were doing well, with only a few losses overall. If they keep up their streak and don't fight teams that are stronger than them, then they will definitely make it to the main stage. As for the rest? Honestly, any of them can make it, but teams like Aurelia's and Indra's are definitely making it, they have remained unbeaten in the preliminary rounds.

We sat around for a few more minutes talking until the food was ready. We went over to the dining table and ate.

"Ottimo~!" Lavinia muttered while eating hers. I'm pretty sure that means 'Delicious' in Italian.

"Not bad," said Yashina, her face flushed as she had her other free hand on her cheek.

Not bad? Your face says that it tasted a lot better than just 'Not bad'. I'm not going to address it.

What we were eating were Soutzoukakia (Greek Meatballs) and Spanakopita (Spinach Pie). I had tasted Spanakopita before and liked it, so having them again wasn't bad.

"Will you add some of this to your menu, Jin?" Amalthea asked. Rini was also curious as she looked at me.

"Maybe the Spanakopita was an appetizer, and Soutzoukakia as a main course meal? Who knows though, but I'll definitely keep it in mind. Although Artemis is coming to my home soon with Athena to make me a homecooked Moussaka," I told them.

"Artemis and Athena, huh?" Amalthea mumbled and looked at her plate. I was curious but didn't ask her about it. For the next few minutes, we ate and chatted about how things were going to change once the Khaos Order was brought down and the tournament ended.

— ○ ● ○ —

We stayed in her home for around thirty minutes before we finally decided to leave.

"Come again, Jin. You're always welcome here," said Rini.

"Yeah, I enjoy this little village's calm atmosphere, although with the new buildings and defenses, it'll feel strange for those who'll come back to it, especially the rabbits that mostly work in Little Olympia."

We visited Germany, then Asgard, and finally Greece to end our day. Things went back to normal quickly, and humans had no idea that anything happened. Although many of them did feel weirdly rested, they didn't think too hard about it.

— ○ ● ○ —

Third Person Point of View

— ○ ● ○ —

"They both failed. Hitler's group is no more, but... Mard Geer and Kyôka split off into their own faction within the Monkai Association," said Promestein. "With that said, where are they?"

"They are participating in Nyx's little 'prank' for the Middleman, although at the same time we're planning on doing our own operation soon," replied the original Leviathan.

"No wonder some of the more competent Executives weren't present during their assault. Did they take most of the youkais with them?" asked Augusta.

"They did. They saw how Black Alice was after gaining new powers from the Phantasma and decided to make their own faction from within the Monkai Association. They knew their downfall was imminent, but they have decided to participate in Nyx's prank since it's a bit more organized," explained Leviathan. "Since my faction and I will be doing our own operation at the same time, it will split their forces in half again."

"What are you aiming for?" asked Chernobog.

"…Ingvild Leviathan, my descendent. Nyx is targeting the Outer God, but I don't care for him; all I want is our descendant who has a Sacred Gear and my trait. If I can extract it and give it to me, it will make things easier. And…her father wishes to use her for something; I don't know what it is," she replied and closed her eyes.

"And the remaining Monkai Association?" asked Oz.

"Their aim is certain hybrids that are close to the Middleman, as well as [Zhuque], the [Scorch Dragon], and what they identified as the [Dreamer], the female that gives off the same 'feeling' as the Middleman," said Leviathan.

"That woman? Yes…she's quite mysterious, but if we take what they meant literally, then wouldn't that mean she's another…Outer God? Are they sure about targeting her?" asked Chernobog.

"What about Genghis Khan? Wasn't he supposed to participate in Nyx's operation?"

"He has pulled away after seeing Hitler's defeat. He wishes to redo his plans so he won't be defeated so easily."

"Hmm, wise choice. Did you hear of the Satanael's plans too?"

"Plans?"

"Hmm. He wishes to attain the [Infinity] for some kind of experiment, although trying to catch that dragon will prove difficult."

"He's a fool if he thinks capturing that monster is possible. She already escaped once; she's not as naïve as she was before."

The remaining members of the Seekers of Truth continued their meeting; eight out of the twelve remain, and more will disappear soon. However, for now, they remain willfully ignorant.

— ○ ● ○ —

CREATORS' THOUGHTS
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Chapter 188: Chapter 9 - Part 4 - Failures of the Past, Lessons of the Future

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