***The Netherrealm, The Olympians***

***Angrod***

“Ahaharharhar!”

I had to admit that I sounded a little deranged as I mangled my first enemy to pieces, his parts flying all over the courtyard. I finally felt alive again! There was nothing that compared to the adrenaline rush of one-sided slaughter!

Cough! – mortal combat, of course. I never wanted to imply that these hillbillies have no chance against me.

Bringing the halberd down and around, I swing it in a wide arc, forcing my opponents back.

Their horrified faces show anger and fear, having witnessed the demise of one of their comrades – who lies now sliced and diced on the ground, no piece larger than a fist.

“Deviant! Ares will destroy you!”

One of them jumps forward, his short-sword moving faster than the eye can follow and my halberd moves almost on its own, blocking the attack. My blades fan out, separating this new challenger from the rest of his companions.

While smiling beneath my mask, I push my opponent back, our auras clashing and melting the ground around us. The man expertly shifts his weight and sparks fly through the air as his weapon slips past the heft of my halberd, aiming directly for my heart. There is a flash of light from beneath my field of vision as his weapon breaks against my armour, leaving him wide open for a counter-attack.

My halberd detaches in the middle, turning into a makeshift axe and a long spike. Smiling, I swing the axe down, the crystal blade cutting smoothly through the god's aura – taking off both his legs at the thighs. He topples over, screaming, and I stab him for good measure before I reunite the two weapons into a staff.

Seeing one of the women cast a complicated spell, I point the staff at her and channel magic into one of the pre-set spell-matrices which I prepared beforehand. I don’t know exactly what her magic is supposed to do, but just a look from afar tells me that it includes mind-altering effects, so I want no part of it.

A hex complicated enough that it would have normally taken me minutes to cast springs forth, enveloping the woman in a burning web of blue energy, fuelled by her very own power.

I revel in the feeling of seeing the naked fear in her eyes when she realizes what the hex is trying to do as it leeches off her aura. Her quick reaction of pushing the energy away and dropping her aura is smart, but wrong.

Had she only taken a second longer to study the hex, she might have found a way to survive.

The energy rebounds back, into her body, and then outwards again. She bursts, the flesh peeled off of her as a meaty, red paste. Her bones pop and their marrow empties on the stone tiles, leaving nothing that resembles the formerly beautiful woman apart from a tuft of straw-brown hair.

“You are so innocent!” I giggle and erect a barrier to block one of my opponents, deflecting a ray of energy upwards that could have levelled the whole castle. “It's like you have spent your entire immortality suppressing mortals! You are so laughingly weak!”

And they are getting desperate, so I shouldn’t let my guard down while mocking them.

That's when the bearded guy charges into my path and something punches my brain, causing me a serious case of brain-freeze. I miss a step and almost fall as I fight back against the unexpectedly strong mental attack.

Thankfully, my training of telekinetically wielding several objects at once requires a stringent compartmentalizing of my mind, and while the attack was surprising, it didn't incapacitate me to the point of having to endure the humiliation of being pounded by a second-rate god.

Arms moving on their own, I reshape the staff into a halberd and block the sparking lightning spear the old fellow threw at me.

My head pulses like a drum as I search out the originator of the ongoing mental attack, seeing him or her as the only real nuisance. I find her standing pressed against the wall, safe behind her pantheon.

It has been a long time since I had a proper battle from mind to mind. Relying on the fundamental concept from which a god draws his strength! There is no greater form of battle than waging ones very soul against another, so I let her in, interested whose divinity would reign supreme as I welcome her with the mental equivalent of a hug.

Chaos against… Wisdom!

Pah! What a weak divinity to base your godly powers on. Wisdom may seem powerful, but only so long as you don’t take into account that it is a concept that’s based on humans, not a fundamental force of nature! There is no wisdom without sentience.

The woman disappoints mere moments after I lowered my mental barriers, giving her an unguarded view into the depths of my divinity. She shudders. Her left eye looks left and the right one strays to the right, rolling. Her lips curl and spit splutters forth as her knees buckle, causing her to topple over like a felled tree, screaming forth incomprehensible gibberish.

“Faceless mien who creates and destroys! Incomprehensible knowledge, sealed by mysterious smiling lips, never to be spoken!”

Twitching, she soils the ground and herself with her own vomit, trying to form words and suck in air, all at the same moment.

“Athena!” one of the gods screams and I smile.

Such is the fate of those who are forced to stray from the path of a linear mind. Maybe this Athena will remember our encounter one day and reach enlightenment about how to go forward as a mind mage.

“Retreat!” the bearded guy orders.

“But we can’t!” one of his minions reminds him. “They somehow blocked the pathways.”

“Don't go.” I lunge at the man, swinging my halberd. “We clearly aren't done, yet!”

He re-summons and moves his lightning spear with utter confidence to block. Our weapons collide, and for a moment in time it seems like this man can actually challenge me, but even if his divinity may be able to take on mine, his weapon is not.

The blade of my halberd cuts through his spear and deep into his torso with a wet 'thwack', amputating his right arm. Ignoring the ensuing silence, I pull my weapon out of their leader, allowing him to collapse to his knees.

He was a simple barbarian with a stick, trying to challenge a man with the equivalent of a lightsabre. His loss wasn't really his fault, so I decide to honour him with enlightenment.

Reaching out, I grasp the struggling man by the throat and lift him up until his face is slightly above mine. Our auras grate against each other, but his is diminishing with his approaching death. There is no true contest.

“Before you touch the daughter of a true god, remember this in your next life and tremble!”

Allowing my aura to surge forth freely, I use all the physical strength my godhood gives me to cast him down to the ground.

The tiles crack with a ‘thump’, and blood splatters onto the surrounding Olympians as the tiles around the impact zone cave in a little.

I admit that I am getting a little overdramatic, but I am not just playing around. The demons surely won’t hold their tongues, and it is likely that what happened here will reach the ears of gods and deities throughout the rest of the multiverse. Maybe not tomorrow, thanks to the inhibition field, but surely in a few weeks or months.

Which means that I have to worry about my reputation. So, when dealing with the rest of the multiverse I don’t want to be seen as weak.

Keeping my halberd raised I step over the corpse, ready to deliver more mayhem. I wait in anticipation of the next attack – but it doesn't come. Those who are left standing look with utter horror at the ground zero of their leader’s fall.

“What's wrong? Who's next?”

The deities look at each other – then they drop to their knees and grovel in the dirt, ignoring that they are soiling their white togas with the blood of their comrades. Two men and four women remain, their faces gaunt with terror.

“Ahem.” Celes steps next to me and places a hand on my shoulder. “I think you’ve established the order of business.”

I tremble, not wanting it to be over. “You promised that I can have them!”

My wife crosses her arms and looks pointedly at the deities who are cowering in the dust. “I know that you are many things. You get excited by a good battle, by chasing down a fleeing enemy, or by punishing those who deserve it.” She gestures at the trembling figures who are pressing their foreheads to the ground. “You take no pleasure from stomping on those who are already broken.”

I return my attention to the survivors, hoping that one of them would look up with defiance in their gaze. But they don't even try to make eye contact. Huffing, I transform my weapon back into a staff and set it on the ground. I slowly relax and retract the organic enchantment, allowing my mask to transform back into horns. “You took all the fun out of it.”

“Yeah...” She looks around, studying the mess I left behind. “I had to stop you before you wasted all the resources.”

“Resources?” I ask, rolling my head. My forehead is still itching, thanks to the mindraper’s attack. She was the only one of the lot who did even a little damage. For the future, I have to keep in mind that Mana Crystal doesn’t make me truly invulnerable… just mostly.

Celes points over her shoulder at something behind us.

I turn around, just to witness Nix bent over the little deity who got past me. She is kissing him. “What the-”

“We are trying to power-level her,” Celes shrugs. “If it worked with Ashley… the only issue is that she is too shy to suck their soul out of them.” She pops her lips. “The kiss-method works too, but it’s much slower.”

“Ah...” I look away. “Well… I can understand that she doesn’t want to fuck her captors.”

Celes coughs. “You realize that you are talking about a true-blooded succubus?”

“Yes, yes.” I wave a hand, indicating the cowering survivors. “But you saw how they treated her. She must be so bored of them that she can’t bear the thought of touching them anymore. Like being forced to drink only coffee for decades. If it was me, I wouldn’t even be able to bear their scent.”

I cast a half-assed healing spell on the mostly-dead, half-insane opponents who I didn’t croak completely. Which means that together with the mind-rapist, we have three- likely two more souls. Gods are exceptionally sturdy thanks to the almost limitless access to mana, so it’s no surprise that even split in twain, and crushed to paste they are almost, but not quite, dead.

Given time, their bodies would regenerate as long as their hearts kept beating and their brains stayed intact. Such is the power of limitless life-force in the form of mana.

“You might be right,” Celes admits while pursing her lips.

Nix gasps and raises herself into a kneeling position, her face pointed to the sky as a godly aura ripples forth from her.

“Seems like it works.” I carefully study her awakening, making sure that the inhibitors are containing the effect of a new god being connected to the network of pathways. But apart from her immediate surroundings, there is no sign of leakage. If anything, her awakening is dampened.

It will have to stay that way until we have a safe base of operations outside the Void Zone.

Celes grumbles and searches through one of her armour’s pockets. “Feels like a cheat. A normal immortal would have to spend eons honing her skills and go through a truly traumatic experience to reach the state of mind which is necessary for ascension.”

“I would point out that any succubus should have had her share of traumatic experiences and violence.” Stepping closer, I try to put an arm around my wife, but she avoids me expertly.

“Please mind your state. You are covered in ‘ick’!” She fishes a blue marble out of her pocket and pops it into her mouth.

I almost do a double-take upon seeing that. Surely it wasn’t… was that one of the data cores which I devised for easier control of crystal tech? They aren’t special, but that’s not the problem here. “Did you just swallow a Mana Crystal?”

“Yes.” She turns and gestures for the three succubi we picked up, pointing out the deities on the ground. “Try your luck. If you ascend, you are employed.”

I ignore the fact that Celes is happily feeding my kills to her minions, or that she is behaving more like Isabella than Myrm. There is a much more urgent matter to address. “Why the fuck are you swallowing Mana Crystals!” It’s like a mortal swallowing iron balls. The best thing that could happen is to get indigestion. The worst… I don’t want to think about the worst.

She shrugs. “I am always watching you improving yourself, even as a god. My problem is that while my internal mana manipulation is powerful, it also limits my possibilities. But your organic enchantments gave me an idea. Yet, Mana Crystal is a powerful substance, impossible to influence without the proper knowledge or the ability to manipulate external energies.”

Celes raises a finger. “But then I thought. What if the Mana Crystal is inside me!? Wouldn’t I be able to interact with it then?”

“You are using your…” I shake my head. “Do you have any idea how dangerous that is?”

“I have now.” She shrugs. “Lucky that I tried it with a little grain the first time. It took several high-grade healing potions to restore my stomach. But I have the trick figured out by now.” She breathes in as if to demonstrate. “Break down the energy, circulate to your central nerve core in your chest, then send it towards the organ or area you want to strengthen and rematerialize the matter. I just have to make sure to incorporate it properly with my organic body. Wanna try it?”

“No, thanks.” I have other ways to gain power. No need to swallow quantum matter which contains enough energy to blow up a planet. “I am just glad that you are healthy.”

“No worries.” Celes pumps her fist. “Let the Council come and they get a Mana Crystal enforced fist to the face!”

Great! Now I have to find a way to defend myself against my own wife. “Wait, is that the reason why it gets easier and easier for you to penetrate my aura in our training duels?”

She looks properly chagrined. “Maybe?”

I growl. “Cheater!”

“I didn’t cheat!”

“You were using Mana Crystal!” I point an accusing finger at her. “The next time I am allowed to use any weapon or armour I want.”

She huffs and returns her attention to our surroundings. The Olympians are still kowtowed, not daring to move a muscle. Katrine is busy with Nix, and the three succubi are latched onto the lips of our defeated foes – one of them clearly out of her depth on how to sexually tease the soul out of a gooey puddle that only roughly resembles a human corpse.

We leave the problem to her and return to our companions while I send a mental signal to our reinforcements. Time to pack things up and return home to plan our next steps. We have done everything we could possibly achieve.

“Nix, are you ready?” Celes asks.

The demoness flexes her fingers, apparently still having to get used to the power and new sensations which come with godhood. “For what?”

“Going home,” I clarify. “Well, going to our realm. We have a lot of questions for you and those Olympians.”

My daughter frowns, then looks at the mess I made. “Shouldn’t you have taken their souls if you want information?”

“Don’t think that they know anything relevant to our cause. Besides, the succubi are ingesting their memories anyway.”

“I remember them.” Nix growls with displeasure. “They were always hanging off my Raxi.”

Raxi? What a nickname for a demon.

Celes and I take a moment to look at each other. Then Celes returns her attention to Nix and takes her arm. “There is a lot we have to tell you, but not here.”

“Go on,” Katrine gestures for us to get going. “The others are packing up the inhibitors and then we will transport the prisoners to the homeworld. I’ll take care that things get cleaned up before we leave.”

Nix raises a hand to stop us. “Does nobody care about my-”

“No.” Holding onto Nix, Celes transports us back to the Eternal Palace, right into an office of our family’s private quarters.

Nix is still trying to grasp her new surroundings when Celes runs off. “I will get someone who can take care of organizing anything she knows.”

Seeing Celes leave through the door, Nix turns on me. “I still don’t know what all of this is about!? Why did you come back now?”

Pulling out a chair from the nearby desk, I gesture for Nix to sit down. “We didn’t leave you intentionally and I promise you that we returned for you as soon as we could. Before you throw a temper tantrum, there are a few things you should know. About your mother, me, this world, and our goals.”

Nix shakes her head. “No, thanks. I would like to remain standing.”

I don’t get to explain much before the door opens and Seria enters the room. Upon seeing Nix, she gasps and runs up to her. Taking the startled succubus’s hand with both of hers, she shakes it, then hugs Nix around the waist.

Nix only looks at me, clearly not knowing what to do with the child. “Who?”

I scratch over the stubbles on my chin. “I suppose you could call her-”

Seria answers the question for me. “It’s so nice to have a big sister! I always wanted one. Big brothers are too easy to abuse, so you might actually present a challenge.”

Nix keeps smiling, but it looks quite forced by now. “I think I have to sit down. And I need some hard liquor while you start explaining things, in detail.” She frowns, searching through her ancient memories. “Without leaving anything out.”