The Dark Sun strode through the halls of the Marine Palace. All its occupants were busy defending its walls, leaving the corridors empty, her journey unhindered.

Jet black flames cascaded down her back in a close approximation of hair and crystalline armour encased her form, the jagged obsidian edges glinting as they reflected the light of the smokeless torches lining the walls. Her face, the only uncovered portion of her skin was deathly pale, further accentuating her glowing golden eyes.

Colour seemed to flee from her, all within her vicinity catching a greyscale palette before reverting to their ordinary hues after her passing. Her footsteps were silent as she navigated the castle with confidence.

Getting here had been difficult. Something to be expected when the place she had been trying to infiltrate was one of the strategic military assets of arguably the foremost nation in the world.

She had been met with hurdles at every step – not the least of which was the vigilant surveillance of not one but two Demigods.

Thankfully her memories from her life as Miyagi Vulpine had allowed her to predict the approximate course of the war. The older kitsune’s ties with the navy before she had transferred to a more landlocked career meant that she had known of the Marine palace’s existence.

Hei Yang had been searching for a breach to board it undetected ever since her composite soul had settled enough to allow her to think clearly.

Meeting Nurarihyon and learning that he was the Felidae boy’s master had been just that breach.

In return for healing him and promising to help him square off against the Kirin head of the household, the Shogun and his loyal servant had plied their connections with the Felidae to infiltrate the Marine Palace. Then they had conducted the ceremony to summon her directly into its interior circumventing all its vaunted defences.

Her footsteps stopped in front of a door, a door which ostensibly led to an unused suite.

The door swung open automatically, revealing an utterly lightless interior.

Not the most welcoming of invitations, but her expressionless face didn’t fluctuate as she stepped through without hesitation.

The doors swung shut behind her of their own accord. Smokeless torches at the corners of the room sprang to life, casting harsh shadows everywhere.

Hei Yang paid them no mind. Silently walking up to the couch and taking a seat in front of the living room table, she waited.

She didn’t have to wait long. The lights flickered for a moment and when they steadied, there was another figure sitting across the table from her.

Pale skin, long black hair that spilled down across the couch and onto the floor, and eyes that were continuous stretches of black – undivided into iris or sclera. Translucent black gauze obscured the lower half of the woman’s face and gloves of black lace encased her arms to her shoulders. She wore a sleeveless dress decorated with liberal amounts of black lace trimmings that flowed down to her ankles.

Morgan Zibeline, Demigod of Darkness, stared coldly at Hei Yang. “Who are you? How did you get here?” she asked, her voice sharp.

“A possible ally, enemy or neutral bystander.” Hei Yang replied in her hoarse, magnetic voice. “I’m here… does it really matter how?”

Morgan narrowed her eyes, then sighed. “I guess not. Not right now, at the very least. I suppose you are here to tell me how to sway your standpoint to each of those three options.”

The Dark Sun nodded. “Certainly. My conditions are simple, well within your power to achieve.”

She indicated towards the windows of the room that were now glowing purple from the light of the pillar of electricity created by Ragyo Kirin’s ascension.

“You are at a rather large disadvantage, aren’t you? Three Demigods against two. Accept all of my conditions and I can help you hold them off long enough for you to evacuate your army. Of course, the Palace will have to stay behind. You won’t have enough mobility otherwise.” A pause. “Or, you can reject some of my demands and both of us can stay in this room and have a nice chat over a cup of tea. As two Demigods with command over darkness I’m sure we have much we can talk about.”

“And the third choice?” Morgan asked, her face impassive.

“The third choice… is for you to fight me here and now.” Hei Yang’s tone grew cold. “If it comes to that I can guarantee your soldiers won’t survive our clash… After all, I’m not restricted by that silly treaty of yours.”

An oppressive silence covered the room as Morgan tried to take her measure.

After a short moment, she said, “So, all your conditions are based on our defeat in this war?”

Hei Yang nodded.

“You ask me to choose between the loss of the Marine Palace; the loss of the Marine palace as well as most of my army; or the loss of the Marine Palace, all of my army, as well as a very real possibility that one of Regiis’ Demigods will fall here?”

“Yes.”

“Won’t you consider fighting fully on our side and holding the Shogunate off until our reinforcements arrive?”

“Unfortunately, no. It is extremely important to me that you lose this battle… And your reinforcements won’t be arriving. They will meet with some obstruction… right about now.”

As if on cue, Morgan received communication from the Wind Wolf through the Nexus. Her expression changed… “The Viking Corsairs…” she muttered in a slight daze.

Morgan had kept herself available at the Nexus. As the Demigod of Darkness and a Grandmaster of the Aspect of Space, she had the ability to shift to whichever of the two fleets the Shogunate decided to attack. She was the final line of safety against Isabella or Fenrir being overwhelmed by the numerical superiority of the opposing Demigods.

The appearance of a wildcard in the form of Hei Yang – a Demigod unbound by the Treaty – had totally skewed the balance of the battle. The fact that was the most frustrating was that Hei Yang had somehow sneaked aboard the Marine Palace, right under Isabella and her noses. And they hadn’t even noticed.

If Hei Yang had been outside the walls of the floating fortress, then Morgan was confident of holding out – two Demigods against four – until Fenrir made his way to them.

As things stood now, fighting Hei Yang in the centre of their army was tantamount to consigning her soldiers to death. Not only that, the Shogunate had somehow convinced the Vikings to mobilize their forces. With the pirates blocking the way, there was no way the Western Armada would be able to make its way to them in time. The loss of the Eastern Armada was nearly inevitable.

She fell into a short silence. Then… “Fine. What are these conditions of yours?”

As though waiting for just those words, Hei Yang stretched out her hand and a rolled-up scroll appeared in it in a burst of dark fire.

Morgan accepted the slightly warm scroll. Unfurling it, she scanned its contents, her eyebrows rising with each subsequent condition.

Coming to the end of the document, she looked up incredulously. “You are the elemental of the Sixth Forbidden Zone?”

Hei Yang waved her issue away. “Not important. So, do you or do you not agree?”

Morgan sighed, then ripped the scroll down the middle. One of the two halves burst into dark flames that moved towards Morgan and seeped into her body, while the other half turned into a patch of shadow and melded into the shadow cast by Hei Yang. Both the Demigods shuddered as the contents of the contract imprinted on their souls.

Morgan rubbed her arms over her gloves to ease the goosebumps. “Doesn’t get any less weird no matter how many times I do it,” she muttered.

“Well,” she said, standing up from the couch and smiling with clearly fake cheer. “Now that that’s over and done with, let’s get out there and have you hold up your part of the bargain.”

Morgan sank into her own shadow, shadow walking out of the room. Dark flames engulfed Hei Yang and she too vanished from her spot.

The torches at the four corners winked out, plunging the empty room into darkness yet again.

…

I woke with the feel of the sun on my face.

“Hnngh.” I groaned. Scrunching my eyes tight and turning over, I buried my face into the pillow. Still the feeling refused to go away, the brightness sending lances of pain through my head.

Growling in discontent, I resisted for a few more moments before slamming my hands down on the mattress in frustration and pushing myself up.

Kicking the covers away, I sat up and finally opened my eyes.

Not only did my head feel like it was filled with cotton – cotton with needles generously sprinkled all over it – my eyes felt dry, the lids scraping over them like sandpaper. But instead of the bright, sunlit room I was expecting, I found myself in a dark cabin.

I rubbed my face. It was odd, I could still feel the warmth.

Suddenly, the single circular window in the room flashed white, illuminating the walls and the bed I was on in a harsh light. The entire room lurched shortly after, nearly sending me toppling off the bed.

As the room steadied again, the memory of where I was flooded back... above an airship having collapsed after overuse of my soul, right in the middle of a war.

I groaned as another spike of pain lanced into my brain. My fingers tightened in my hair. I was definitely never doing this again.

Still, nothing that would explain that odd warmth.

Getting off the bed, I rose to my feet. Staggering unsteadily to the window, I looked out.

My eyes widened and my jaw dropped in shock.

A pillar of violet lightning connecting heaven and earth; a dark sun that floated above the battlefield, leaching all colours in its area of illumination; a massive, serpentine dragon made of the same greyish-white mist that concealed the Shogunate fleet, a crow composed of the darkest shadows perched on its shoulder; tens of violent tornadoes that roamed through the battlefield.

It was a scene straight from the apocalypse.

I immediately realized the source of the uncomfortably warm feeling. It was my soul sense passively picking up the combined aura of six Demigods confronting each other.

‘Damn it,’ I cursed in my mind. ‘Can’t a man take a nap around here without the world coming to an end?’

End of Volume.