Tales of the Old World Demon Lord

Chapter 52 – White End

[Eternum Calendar 1972]

[Adaptive Form].

That was the name of the core ability that defined the deity known as ‘Dagda’. Even on its own it was a rather powerful ability, allowing the user to shift into a form more suited for its current environment and situation. It would not be an exaggeration to call this power the epitome of nature’s creation. Immortality accompanied with the ability to instantaneously adapt…

Once more Dagda had been revived.

His iron grey carapace had disintegrated into the ether as it did before, yet what now hatched from the cocoon was not the same white berserker but a red demon. A shining coat of blood colored skin, large crown like horns encompassed his forehead, eyes burning with red and white fury. His fingers were replaced with sharp black blades that seemed like it could dice through solid steel. The only points of similarity were the ominous black markings etched all over his body and the large death colored wings on his back.

‘… Speed and agility,’ Errick Rommel thought to himself as he observed the new form. He did not quite understand in full the exact mechanics of how this ability operated but if he had to guess it was ‘adaptation’. Prior to this Errick had shown overwhelming power, thus the ability took on a berserker form in order to compensate. Now with the use of [Overload], it most likely felt that power was meaningless if it could not hit, thus to compensate it shifted its focus to speed.

Whether all of this information was true or not remained to be seen, however Errick Rommel was an immortal being with more battle experience than anything on this planet. His intuition, his human cognitive function accompanied by his myriad of experiences was telling him that this was the case.

Dagda rose up from the floor, smiling ominously and bearing his shark-like jagged teeth at Errick as he did. Yet before Errick even had the chance to reply to this odd behavior Dagda had completely vanished from the spot almost instantaneously. His hunch had proven correct; Dagda’s speed had indeed increased tremendously. That being said, it was not as though it was at all unpredictable, Dagda was not so fast that Errick could not see the general trajectory of the attack.

‘Overload,’ Errick commanded in his own mind as the world came to a grinding halt. Soundless stagnation overtook everything with the exception of one thing. There was now an opponent in which he could duel with in this frozen world.

Dagda appeared behind him, trying to strike Errick’s back to enact some sort of revenge. This kind of movement was not only completely within expectation but also droll and a boring waste of a move. Errick did not have to do much in order to parry the attack. However even as he saw the attack coming he did not choose to do anything about it and thought to accept the attack in full.

As expected, the brutal red hand penetrated through Errick’s back, black claws shining piercing through out onto the other side. With a large, hearty grin plastered all of his face, Dagda relished in his own achievements, thinking that he had overcome Errick as the revenge he so desired was given to him. What he had failed to realize was that organic beings and mechanical beings were quite different in how their bodies functioned, especially in regards to the nervous system.

Being completely mechanized, Errick did not have much reason to continue keeping his ability to feel pain. While it was important for contextual reasons on organic beings, with his ability to survey his environments at high speeds to understand the full context it was entirely unnecessary. Thus taking advantage of this Errick calmly proceeded to grab Dagda’s arm and tore it off with ease.

“Raaaghh!”

Dagda shouted in pain. Not even allowing the enemy enough time to fully express his pain, Errick moved in and delivered a swift punch to the gut. This time activating the [Kinetic Repulsion] ability along with it, Dagda flew all the way across the broken forest.

Wasting no time in this brief opportunity Errick chanted more words. His speed and power was about the same as Dagda’s, thus what was necessary now was more firepower. With his near infinite ability to regenerate, the only feasible way of defeating Dagda was through the [Skyfall Project]. It was a weapon that could destroy him on a molecular level, however there was one drawback, and this was that only Director Sovereign could access the full capacity of the weapon.

While other Upper Echelon members were also given access to the weapon however their output was limited to about 20%. With that amount of power it was unknown if Dagda could survive that kind of blast. In order to eliminate any sort of doubts Errick had deemed it necessary to whittle the enemy down as much as he could beforehand.

“[Weapon Code 9829I7B2, Matter Reconstruction.]”

Materializing into his hand was a miniaturized missile launcher. Mounting it on top of his shoulders he aimed towards the sky a shot a few projectiles high up. This was not as a test but for preparation.

As expected, Dagda recovered much quicker than the last time and even managed to cover a large amount of distance in mere seconds. Appearing just before him with his bladed claws, yet this time trying to be unpredictable did not go for a full frontal assault and instead disappeared into the wind just as fast as he appeared.

“No matter.”

It didn’t matter where Dagda appeared from next because before he could even appear, or more precisely, just as he appeared the missiles landed back towards Errick’s location. Erupting and encapsulating everything with almost a nuclear level inferno. A large portion of the forest was ‘cleansed’ away in a purifying nuclear fire, not even the ashes of trees remained, everything turning into a black charcoal desert.

Errick’s own armor plating was resistant to the kind of explosions caused by his own weaponry. This kind of trait was designed more specifically in order to reduce accidents from friendly fire, however it had evolved into a legitimate strategy to abuse them. These kinds of direct point blank attacks were regularly used by mechanized soldiers who took advantage. At first it was just a slightly effective way the lower level soldiers did things but somewhere down the line even Errick had adopted the strategy. A suicide attack without actually killing oneself; it was both very surprising and hard to deal with for the enemy.

Though this kind of blast would kill just about anything on the planet, Dagda was one of the very few exceptions. Crouching down before him, both of his arms destroyed, one of his wings completely torn apart and the other also almost gone, the horns on his head except one small portion had also been broken off, Dagda could hardly even breathe with this intoxicating and burning air.

“Dagda… you’ve certainly grown a lot more powerful than the last time. So much so that you may even come to pose a real threat to us one day, thus in order to avoid that future, let us end everything here. This is a final act of mercy from me.”

Out of his left breast pockets, Errick took out a small switch like object with a red button on top of it. Unable to move, unable to speak and unable to even hear what Errick had just said, Dagda could only just stare menacingly at Errick’s hand. ‘Your first mistake was your own existence,’ Errick thought as he unhesitatingly pressed the red button.

…

As though it were alive, the grounds beneath Dagda’s foot growled in a low, daunting hum. It started to shake, first very subtly then progressively it became more violent then eventually even devastating, turning and carving up the land. It wasn’t an earthquake; it just didn’t feel like that, rather it felt as though something many times worse was happening.

‘He did something… again!’ Dagda thought to himself as he glared at the switch like object in Errick’s hands. The very air around him started to intensify, gaining the property of ‘weight’ as everything now pushing down to suppress him. Even the blood in his veins felt like it would rip his flesh asunder and jump out of his body. Just the act of kneeling on the floor became a struggle and breathing was no longer possible.

“Wha… aaa… kuh…”

He couldn’t even talk, moving his mouth was impossible as well.

Yet even though they inhabited the same space, Errick Rommel seemed completely unaffected by this mysterious shift in the world’s property. Standing tall, Errick ‘observed’ him through that singular red glare as though a child coldly staring down at ants he was about to kill. This feeling of humiliation and suppression was starting to eat away at his very sanity. Frustration, desperation, anguish… various negative emotions welled up inside him, trying to burst out but even they were suppressed by this horribly oppressive atmosphere.

“Graviton Detonators… perhaps your world has not yet understood the properties of gravity but we have already mastered it. What you are feeling now is the intensification of the gravitational force in the local area. Specifically it’s a 400% increase to everything, your weight, the air molecules around you… even your own blood should feel that much heavier.”

Such an explanation had not sufficed enough for Dagda to understand what was going on but he got the gist of it. He turned back to his own torn off right arm, it should have already healed by now yet it didn’t. Even though he could see itself trying desperately to repair back to the way it was, nothing happened. His self-regeneration ability was being impeded by this oppressive air.

“Tissue regeneration requires oxygen to recover effectively, however with the intensified gravity your lungs and blood aren’t able to properly pump that oxygen to your wounds. Though given enough time you’d probably heal anyway but the process will be extremely slow and I do not intend to give you that leisure.”

Helplessly Dagda could only stare back with a sharp glare. Bearing his fangs did nothing to improve the situation. It merely served as a silent protest from a defeated dog.

“Truly… you have entertained me greatly. An immortal’s life can be rather boring at times, but there are also a lot of genuinely interesting things in this world. You are amongst one them, however all things must come to an end.”

Errick stretched out his arms in a grand fashion and started to chant in a foreign language.

“[********** ****** ** ******* *********, ***** ****: ***** *******. *** ****** ********. **** ** ****.] Good bye.”

Speaking those final words Errick stared up towards the blue skies. Following that gaze Dagda did the same and upon doing so saw an impossible sight. A small slit in the very sky, opening up as though an eye. A black an empty void surrounded a blood red spherical object… ‘The moon!’

Upon realizing what it was that he saw… everything dissolved into white. Colors faded off the objects and shapes were blurred out. All that was there was an empty white void along with an extremely tempting sensation of fatigue overcoming him. Dagda felt that closing his eyes now would most likely mean that he would never again open them, however he could not help himself.

His eyelids felt so extremely heavy, his feelings of frustration and desperation seemed to evaporate as though they never existed. If this was what accepting ‘peace’ felt like then it was an insidiously cruel force. He could almost feel a smile etching onto his face as his consciousness continued to fade away.

He was tired…

He wanted to sleep…

Forever…

‘[Do not die…]’ a mysterious, almost aroma like voice echoed through Dagda’s mind. Language similar to the ones spoken by Errick Rommel, yet he somehow found that he could understand. Just hearing it once was enough to invigorate his corroding spirit; rekindling a desire to rise once more and to face his greatest nemesis.

Dagda gradually opened his eyes back to the cruel white void. Doing so revealed that he was no longer alone; a transparent silhouette of a feminine figure embraced him lovingly, as though a mother holding her child. A small transparent dome was erected around them, shielding him from both the oppressive gravitational force and the white light that was siphoning away his life.

“[Fight…]”

The mysterious figure spoke to him. Once more a powerful, invigorating force circulated through his very being, filling him up with a strength that even he didn’t know existed. ‘This power… I can win!’ he thought to himself as he clenched his fists.

“Yes… I can win.”

He repeated to himself as he smiled.

…

“*******…”

Like a god Nemesis peered down at the hapless inhabitants of this world from the air. No doubt they were frozen with awe at her mere appearance. One of them even called out to her but they were not in words she could understand. However this fact did not bother her even in the slightest, to her the words of primitives and mindless animals were both too insignificant.

The only real solace in finding out about the existences of these primitive beings was that there was at least some sort of ‘intelligent’ life in this new world. Though she loathed the very idea of labeling them as ‘intelligent’ as it would put her and them on the same level, for now it was only used as a purely scientific category.

‘They look human, but also not…’ she thought to herself. In physical appearance they looked no different from the humans she had known all her life, however there was a key difference in their aura. Perhaps it was her decades of experiences as a soldier or her intuition as a psychic but something at the back of her mind told her that they were ‘different’; not true humans. It was this ‘difference’ that repulsed her- to her they seemed like nothing more than imposters wearing human skin.

When she first appeared it was apparent that some kind of altercation was happening and she stepped in and killed one of them on a whim. It wasn’t as though she was trying to save the other three, she merely wanted to test out the defensive capabilities of this world’s residents. In fact she had half a mind to outright slaughter the other three as well just on sheer scientific curiosity alone but refrained from doing so.

There was also no real reason for refraining to kill them, though if one had to absolutely conjure up one, then it was because they held human forms. She wasn’t a complete psychopath; even the ‘super soldier’ Nemesis had some reluctance to kill other humans. If they did anything suspicious or hostile then she would instantly massacre them without a second thought, however as long as they did not bother her in any way then whether they lived or died was irrelevant.

Humans went about their way without caring about how ants lived or died, thus in the same way she chose to let them live… purely on a whim.

“*** *** ***?”

One of them seemed to pose a question but she couldn’t understand. No, from their tone of voice what they were trying to ask was obvious but she continued to feign ignorance. Right now she had more important priorities on her mind and just confirming the existence of neo-humans was enough for her.

She decided to ignore them and leave, however the moment she turned around to do so something else had caught her interests. Something extremely worrisome but also at the same time it was something that filled her with sense of ‘hope’.

Hope that she was not truly alone in this world… Far off in the distance in the direction of the forest was a light; an extraordinarily bright pillar of light raining down from above the clouds. In an instant she knew what this light was.

“[The light of Gungnir…?!]”

Uprooting the two nearest houses with her psychokinetic power she thought to use them as smashing weapons. The grounds shook and crumbled as the houses were violently torn from their rightful place and hovered around her. Without wasting any more time she flew towards the light pillar at top speeds, disappearing just as quickly as she appeared.