Primus Domain.

Crimson and emerald flames clashed near a certain hospital. Leon and Ranga were exchanging fierce attacks causing thundering explosions. Leon stepped on the ground and it erupted like a volcano. Lava rushed towards Ranga who repelled it with an emerald blast. He spread his arms and countless emerald arrow formed behind him. He clasped his hands and the arrows rushed towards Leon. Leon conjured a sword made of crimson lightning and swung down. An overwhelming force rushed forth, bursting open the earth, and obliterated the arrows. Ranga popped up on his flank and slammed his fist in his side. Leon was blown back and Ranga chased after him. He popped up in front of Leon and threw another punch. Leon countered with a cross punch and they were both blown back.

Leon twisted his body upside down in the air and clawed the earth. The ground lit up and exploded with Ranga. He flew out of the explosion with his fists glowing. He threw a punch and Leon was hit by an overwhelming force. Leon held his ground and flew at Ranga. The two immediately entered a melee. Leon kicked Ranga under his chin while Ranga hit him with a right hook. Ranga hit him with a roundhouse to the side and he hit him back with a punch to the chest. Like this, the two clashed in a battle of fists. Marc watched this battle with a small smirk.

“As expected of Leon, he just ascended to godhood but he already knows how to fight with his newfound strength. Ranga still has the advantage though.”

He looked at Sasha who was laid out.

“With this much commotion killing Leon is no longer possible.”

He smiled.

“Guess it’s time to retreat.”

He jumped down from the top floor of the hospital and landed on the ground. A gigantic demon sigil appeared underneath him. This sigil caught Leon’s attention and allowed Ranga to get a punch in.

“That’s…”

Marc smiled at him.

“It’s unfortunate but this is where we part, Brother.”

Leon glared at his brother after being forced away.

“Marc, you’ll pay for your sins.”

“I’m sure I will, but right now I’m just enjoying myself. I hope you won’t hold a grudge for the whole killing you thing. It was just business and nothing personal.”

“I’ll kill you the next time we meet.”

Marc smiled.

“I look forward to our reunion, Brother.”

A demonic gate appeared underneath Marc. Ranga leaped and landed beside him.

“Gate of Babel.”

The gate opened up like a mouth and swallowed the two of them. It disappeared without a trace a second later. Leon clenched his fist while staring at the spot his brother was before. He then quickly made his way to his wife.

Near the royal palace, a portal opened up in the sky. A bright light descended from it and hit the ground. When the light faded, Gizmo appeared along with an army of criminals and traitors from the three clans. In front of him stood the empire’s greatest criminal, Andre Bernard.

“This place hasn’t changed in the last century I was imprisoned.”

Gizmo looked around. The city was on fire and most of the capital was reduced to rubble. The smell of death and burning flesh polluted the air.

“This is how you remembered the capital?”

“Yeah. It was just like this when I visited.”

(Ah, that’s right. He killed half the population the last time he was here.)

“It’s good to see that Krow and Alexis are doing their jobs properly. I guess it’s my time to get to work. I’ve been locked up for a while so it might take some time for me to get into the groove of things.”

“Unfortunately, I can’t allow you to get into the grove.”

Gizmo looked up and saw someone floating in the air using dragon wings. This person’s appearance made everyone there stiffen with fright. Only Andre remained nonchalant.

“I figured that you’ll come for me the moment I’m freed, Nero.”

“Of course. As the one who imprisoned you, it’s my duty to keep you in check.”

“You talk as if you defeated me before.”

“I think imprisoning you for a century qualifies as a win.”

“But you were unable to kill me. No matter how hard you tried you couldn’t do it. Until you kill me I haven’t lost. Besides, look around and tell me who looks like the winner here.”

Nero nodded.

“You do have a lot of followers now. That’s why I’m gonna kill them all.”

A fireball formed on the tip of his finger. He threw it at Andre and it transformed into a sun that covered the sky. The heat from the sun caused the ground to dry up and the surroundings were quickly reduced to a desert.

“Ahhh?!”

The traitors and prisons fell to their knees holding their throats. Even breathing scorched their lungs.

“Quick to get violent as always.”

Andre was unaffected by the sun’s effects. He snapped his fingers. The next instant the heat disappeared and those around him were no longer suffering.

“The heat is gone but how? The sun….”

The sun stopped a couple of meters above them. Despite it being so close, it wasn’t harming them at all. The sun turned into stone and then crumbled into dust.

“Tsk. I was hoping that being trapped in isolation would’ve made you too weak to use your ability. I guess we’ll have to do this the hard way.”

A black sword formed in Nero’s hand. He lifted the sword and swung it down. At that moment, the world turned pitch-black. Gizmo couldn’t see or hear anything around him. He couldn’t feel anything or talk. A deep fear crept into his heart. He started to wonder if he was dead.

“?!”

Suddenly, light pierced through the darkness and all of his senses returned to him. He was on his knees breathing heavily and sweating hard. He looked around and everyone was just like him. There were giant cuts all over the place. Only where he and the others stood were unscathed.

“Get a hold of yourself.”

He felt a touch on his shoulder and looked up.

“If you’re having this much trouble from a practice swing then you’ll never survive him getting serious.”

(Practice swing? I was disconnected from reality by a practice swing?)

Gizmo saw the cocky smile on Nero’s face as he rested the sword on his shoulders.

“To think that you’d protect a group of sinners to this extent.”

“They freed me so I must return the favor by allowing them to leave here alive.”

“And what’s makes you think they’ll leave alive?”

“Because I willed it.”

Nero burst out laughing.

“It’s rare to run into someone as arrogant as myself. That’s why I’ll miss you when you’re dead.”

Several holes opened up in Andre’s body. Blood sprayed into the air and stained the ground.

Andre looked down at the holes with a frown.

“This was a perfectly good suit, you know.”

A thunderous sound reverberated. Gizmo saw Nero fly through the air with a trail of blood following him. Another deafening sound and Andre was laying in a crater. Nero was standing next to the crater, looking down on Andre who was trying to sit up. He lifted his sword. An enormous explosion devoured him. When it cleared there was a lake of lava where he stood. Andre sprung to his feet with all of his wounds healed. He snapped his fingers the lava transformed into earth. He sighed and placed his hand on his hip.

“Listen, let’s just stop this.”

The ground burst opened and Nero emerged with his sword in his hand.

“And why should I?”

“I can’t get serious because I’m protecting them and you can’t get serious because it will deal even more damage to the country. Us fighting is pointless.”

“Then you’re saying that I should just let you leave with these traitors?”

“Why not? It’s not like you really wanna kill them? If you did, they would be dead already. I don’t know why but you don’t seem to care about what’s going on. I’m sure you have your reasons though.”

Gizmo saw a small smirk in Nero’s face. That’s when he realized Andre was right, Nero doesn’t care about the traitors. He didn’t know why but his body began to tremble.

(Could this be something that he wanted all along? But why?)

He stole a glance at Nero and was shocked to see that he was looking directly at him. His body flinched and Nero smiled. He turned his attention back to Andre.

“Alright, you can leave.”

Everyone’s eyes widened. The smile on Nero’s face widened.

“But first, I’ll have to punish everyone here.”

He lifted his sword in the air and all the color vanished from the world. Gizmo’s chest burst open and his beating heart and lungs fell out. He opened his mouth to scream but his tongue transformed into a snake and stabbed into his eye. The tongue serpent moved through his eye sockets, wiggling in his skull. He could feel it brushing against his brain. He fell to his knees and his lower body shattered to bloody pieces of flesh. He fell on his back with his arms flailing. His stomach opened up and his innards crawled out of his body like a spider. His dome opened up like a latch and his brains fell out. His blood leaked from his body and flowed into his mouth causing him to drown in it. Despite all of this, Gizmo was alive and he could clearly feel everything that was happening to him. The disgusting and painful sensations were driving him crazy.

“Alexis’ apprentice.”

Gizmo blinked and he was back to normal. He touched himself in disbelief. He looked around and saw people on the ground holding their heads with tears streaming from their eyes.

“What was that?”

“Torment of the Demon Dragon God. It’s Nero’s favorite illusion technique.”

“Illusion? That was an illusion….”

He looked around. Nero was nowhere to be seen.

“He really let us go. Why?”

“Instead of asking why, be grateful that he did. I can take him but you guys would die in the process.”

“….Not many people can say that they can take him with such confidence.”

“That’s because most people are insects compared to me.”

He started walking away. Gizmo stared at his back.

(The reason Andre Bernard is so powerful is because of an ability he was born with called Law Maker. He can bend reality to his whim like a god. Of course, it has a limit but that limit is unknown.)

Gizmo and the others followed behind him.

“Compared to him, I guess most people are insects.”

In the throne room, Nova was sitting on the throne. At his feet, were homunculi corpses.

“Looks like you had fun.”

He spoke to his father who walked in with a smile on his face. Nero looked around.

“I’m the one who should be saying that.”

From top to bottom, the throne room was covered with blood. The corpses on the ground were all headless. The heads were stacked beside Nova with him resting his hand on it.

“So how did it go?”

“They got away.”

“Then, everything is going the way you wanted it. If the others find out you’ll be called a traitor.”

“Call me what you want. If this is my chance to get my family back, I’ll take it.”

“I just hope your decision doesn’t come to bite us in the ass later.”

Nero was about to say something when he saw a message on his phone. When he saw it his expression changed.

Meanwhile, in the capital. A gate opened up and Marc and Ranga appeared.

*BOOM!*

They were hit by a shockwave and was nearly blown away.

“The fuck?”

Marc looked around and saw a burning wasteland. Another shockwave hit them and sent rolling.

“Are they still fighting?”

Marc laid on the ground. In the sky, he saw someone clashing with five monsters.

“He’s actually fighting all five guardians. Krow is a real beast.”

He sat up.

“We need to go, so he needs to wrap this up.”

“I guess you’re right.”

Marc snapped his fingers and a gigantic crimson sigil appeared underneath him.

“Hm? That’s the signal. Looks like my time is up.”

“Damn you, Krow!”

Raven rushed at Krow and released a gigantic flame breath. Krow smiled and waved his hand. The flame extinguished and Raven and the other guardians were blasted away with a thunderclap.

“It was nice playing with you guys but it seems that my time is up.”

Krow descended and landed next to Marc and Ranga. Crimson light engulfed the three of them.

“Krow!”

Raven rushed at them.

“See ya, Raven. I can’t wait for us to fight again.”

Krow’s childish smile and waving made Raven’s skin crawl. Despite knowing that he couldn’t reach Krow, he felt that he couldn’t make him leave because it could be the end of the clan as he knew it. That’s when Krow said something that made him freeze.

“Oh, tell Miko I’m looking forward to the next time we meet. I look forward to him using Primordial Chaos Lord just so I can beat it.”

Krow disappeared into the light while laughing. Raven stood and stared at where he was with a blank stare.

“He knew about Chaos Primordial Lord and wasn’t even a bit concerned….Are you kidding me? That’s the empire’s greatest trump card. It’s the reason why we sought Tiamat’s proxy for so long. With it, we should be invincible…”

He clenched his fists.

“He took on all five guardian beasts proxies like it was nothing. Even if the guardian beasts themselves were freed from their restrictions our victory isn’t guaranteed especially with those behind him.”

He looked up at the sky.

“Failing to kill you here will definitely be my biggest failure in life, Krow!”

Present time. Despite most of the country is in ruins, Newgate City, Elon, and Sawyer were pretty much untouched. On a certain airstrip in Elon, Miko and the others were on an aircraft waiting for it to take off. The aircraft was incredibly large and divided into sectors. In one of the sectors, everyone who was seriously injured in battle was being treated inside a medical capsule. Miko was one of the few who refused any treatment.

“Are we going to the Dragna Empire, Miko?”

Luka knew that it was a stupid question but she felt that she needed to say something to diffuse the tension in the air.

“No.”

His answer shocked her.

“Then where are we going?”

“The Azalea Kingdom.”

She furrowed her brows.

“Why?”

“You heard my plans for after this war, didn’t you?”

Miko looked perplexed as if he couldn’t understand why Luka was acting oblivious. This irritated her.

“I remember your plans but I thought with everything going on….”

“What’s going on is irrelevant.”

(Irrelevant? What about your mother?)

“I admit that I got a bit emotional but these things take priority.”

“…..Well, I’m glad that you’re being clearheaded but-”

“Luka, I’m fine. There’s no need to worry.”

“…..Alright.”

Miko silently looked out the window. He clenched his fist tightly while mumbling.

“One step at a time, Miko. One step at a time.”