“This is the end.”

While saying so, Key’s eyes were filled with murderous intent. And even though he’s wearing a helmet that feeling was transmitted to Elthesius which made him chuckle.

[How audacious of you to say that in front of me.]

Using only his sheer strength, Elthesius slowly pushes back Key who’s pushing him down with his twin flaming blades.

“>”

After making a loud call, all of a sudden, two mechanical arms grew under Key’s arms and grabbed Elthesius’ arms restraining him. This is because Key also fused his familiar in the armor.

Sensing danger, Elthesius gathered his wing blades to attack Key.

Unfortunately, Elthesius’ wing blades cannot fire anymore > because Elthesius is running out of power. This is because Senmael himself is only a human and only has mana equaling five average mages.

In normal cases, Senmael would be able to hold out for many hours with his armor on. But since Elthesius kept on using grand techniques towards Key, Senmael’s mana ran out faster than anticipated.

Elthesius is well aware of this fact and thus tried to end the battle quickly. Unfortunately, he did not expect Key to be well versed in magic in such a short time and even managed to make strong magic and adapt to the stolen Divine Fragment. Because of that, he miscalculated and ran out mana faster than anticipated.

The wing blades came flying towards Key’s back. However,

“>”

Before the blades could land on him, Key suddenly slip out of the armor in a half-transparent state leaving the armor for his familiar’s control.

Seeing such unprecedented action, Elthesius became surprised and left and opening.

Not missing that chance, Key jumped towards Elthesius with his arms open like he was going to catch something.

“But first, let me take this guy.”

Going through the armor, Key immediately grabbed Senmael who is possessed by Elthesius. Key separated their consciousness using > which is converted into > so that Senmael’s soul wouldn’t get damaged during the process. However, it also means that he forcibly removed the [Divine Fragment] and rendering Senmael powerless.

After Key tackled Senmael out of the armor with Shell holding it, he put Senmael in a safe place since he is unconscious.

Since his host was removed, Elthesius’ existence became unstable. However, his strength also rose as it also had lost his limiter. He threw Shell in the air with his wing blades tearing the armor into scraps of metal before disappearing.

[YOU DARE DO THAT TO ME!?]

“Yeah, and now that Senmael’s out of the way, I don’t have to hold back my punches anymore.”

Seeing Key confidently say those words, Elthesius felt a cold feeling crawling up him and caused him to unconsciously step back.

He understood well that the power of Infinity is great, but he did not expect that a mere human could control it to its full potential. But because Key showed such confidence in front of him, it’s hard for him to call it a bluff.

Then, Key reequipped the > along with the >, and with a burst, Key flew towards Elthesius with his blades flaming with the > enchantment.

“From what I understand, you gods are greedy bunches, right?”

After dodging Key's flashing slash attack, Elthesius used his wing blades to divert Key’s attention.

To counter that, Key released eight > and have them fight. But since Key could only barely control one, he also fused Shell’s consciousness which is naturally adept in fighting so that he could leave them alone without interrupting him.

With Key approaching him with high speed, Elthesius stopped on his tracks and decided to fight against Key with everything he’s got.

But when he turned, Key was already in front of him.

Grabbing both of his arms, Key stretched out his back. And then suddenly, he gave Elthesius a strong head-butt that broke his own helmet. But it only left huge cracks on Elthesius’ helmet.

Seeing Key’s fearless smile and glowing eyes, Elthesius froze.

“However, a mortal’s greed is greater than anyone. >”

Activating his ring, runic symbols could be seen flying around with them as the center.

[T-this, this power! Isn’t this the Ring of Voices from the Void? So you’re Lithius’ puppet?!]

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I’m going to kill you in the name of my grandfather and for the safety of my family.”

After finding the [Divine Fragment], the [Wind of Divinity], Key used all of his strength to absorb it into him.

[Don’t! Stop that! Without this, I will not be able to come down here!]

“Where’s the downside of that?”

[Your soul will not be able to contain more than one fragment. If you absorb this, your soul would be destroyed.]

“Like I fucking care!”

After taking in the fragment into his chest, Key then kneed Elthesius’ belly and threw him up in the air.

“Now die!”

With the > holding Elthesius’ limbs to prevent him from moving in the air, Key charged a ball of dangerous magic power on his hands.

[We gods do not die.]

“THEN GO BACK TO WHERE YOU CAME FROM! >”

After clasping the dangerous power in between his hands, he opens them and shows his palm towards Elthesius. Then, a huge ghastly green colored beam came out and erased Elthesius’ presence in the mortal realm.

“Take that you shitty gods.”

After saying those words, Key’s armor disappeared and he drops on the ground while losing all his strength.

*Returning to our MC’s point of View*

I see you have taken fragments into your body, young one.

From the darkness surrounding me, a familiar female voice spoke with a gentle tone towards me.

--Am I dead?

Fortunately, you have not. Although you’re body has been greatly weakened by your previous battle, your soul has remained intact despite containing two Divine Fragments.

--I see. So was it wrong to take the Divine Fragments into me?

No, it was not. But however, I do not recommend you absorbing more since you only survived out of sheer luck and resolution. If you meet another user of a Divine Fragment, do not absorb them. Convert them.

--Convert?

Yes, convert. This is the reason why the God of Flame, Maltirus, wasn’t able to control you. Because of the power I bestowed upon you, the ring automatically converted the Divine Flame to Flame of Infinity and thus became your own. However, it does not change the fact that there are now two Divine Fragments inside you.

--If I absorb another Divine Fragment, what will happen to me?

Your soul will not be able to contain that much power and be destroyed. Right now, you are fortunate enough to survive housing two fragments inside you because of foreign influences.

--Foreign Influences?

Yes. These two influences are the ones that prevented your soul from shattering. One preserved your soul using a special connection which stopped it from breaking, and one used a special ability to absorb all dangerous mana leaking from your spirit in order to prevent further damage.

--Are you talking about Cherry and Matt?

Be thankful to them because you will have to rely on them from now on.

Like that, the darkness suddenly disappears and light came into vision.

***

Heavy!

I slowly open my eyes while feeling every limb from my body to check if they’re still intact.

I’m in my room.

When I look out the window, it’s already dark and the snowy clouds have disappeared showing the stars and two moons.

“Come to think of it, this is the first time I’ve seen the two moons.”

As I mutter to myself, I look at my chest where a heavy object has been pressing.

When I raise my blanket, I found Marie sleeping soundlessly while holding on the bandage wrap around my body. And on the sides, Cherry is sleeping with a thin dress that exposes a bit of her skin and underwear, and Matt, she’s sleeping with her pajamas on. But judging from the feeling of elasticity on my left arm, she’s not wearing a bra. On the other hand, their hair is glowing in emerald and gold.

Oh right, I broke some ribs. But since it doesn’t hurt, Cherry might have healed me with her magic or potion while I was asleep.

I caress the hair of Marie and look at my side. I notice him coming into the room, but not from the front door.

“Looks like you’re fine already.”

“Yeah, more or less. How long was I out?”

As I gently put Marie to my side in front of Cherry to sit up, Sora stood and leaned on the wall while looking out the window.

“You’ve been asleep for three days straight. During that time, Cherry and Matilda won’t stop crying. They just stopped a couple of hours ago.”

“Did they see?”

“Everything. They even tried to intervene, but I know well what could have happened if they did. The enemy that time was a ‘God’ after all so I have to give it my all just to stop them.”

“I see, thanks.”

Then, Sora crossed his arms and closed one eye then activating the open one while looking at me.

“But anyway, I see you’ve taken another power.”

“You can see the Divine Fragments?”

Sora replied with a nod. After that, he deactivated his eye.

“I’m a bit surprised. Normally, one person shouldn’t be able to contain more than one divine fragment inside them.”

“I guess I’m a rare case. Lithius also said the same thing.”

“Lithius, the Goddess of the Void? Did you talk to her?”

“Yeah, in my dream, she said that I almost died trying to contain another fragment within me but I didn’t because of some special influences.”

“Influences, like the [Golden Soul Union]?”

“Yes, but not just that. It’s also because of Matt’s drain ability. Thanks of them, I managed to survive.”

Then, I activated my ring and used short teleportation. A magic circle formed on my bed and on floor in front of the window. From sitting on the bed, now I’m standing in front of the window without wearing a shirt.

“Thinking back, I didn’t really understand what was running in my mind. All I could think of was to kill the ‘God’ in front of me like, I felt like I wasn’t really myself.”

“Maybe it was just your will to protect.”

“I don’t know. I’m not sure if it’s that’s the case. To be honest, I’m starting to get scared of myself.”

While I’m watching the sky from the window, Sora also copied me while making a wry smile.

“Then how about this? If you go astray, I’ll guide you. If you forget who you are, I’ll remind you. If you become someone else we don’t know, I’ll beat you up and return you back to your senses.”

Because of what he said, I couldn’t help but laugh a bit.

“You’re out of character Sora, but thanks.”

I then offered my fist to him and he hit it back.

“But if I fall into evil, I want you to be the one who’ll kill me.”

“Of course, I’m your best friend after all.”

And without saying anymore words, he sunk into the darkness of his shadow and disappeared.

***

“K-Key!?”

When I was about to get out of the room, Cherry suddenly woke up while wearing a surprised expression.

“I’m sorry if I worried the two of—!”

Immediately after getting up out of the bed, she ran to me and put her lips on mine while shedding tears.

I guess I worried them more than I expected.

I then separated my lips from hers and put a bit of distance.

“I’d like to—”

Just when I was about to talk, she suddenly kissed me again. This time, she’s forcing herself on me. And again, I pushed her back.

“—hey, let me finish my—”

*kiss*

“hey!”

*Kiss*

“-*cough* that’s eno—”

*kiss*

“—haaah!!! Are you trying to kill me?!”

“Why didn’t you ask for help from us!? Aren’t we supposed to be your fiancées?! You could have died back there! Do you know how it feels to see the one you love getting beaten near his death?!”

While I’m trying to relieve myself from the suffocating Cherry caused by her barrage of kisses, she cried out to me with large tears coming out from her eyes.

“But I won didn’t I?”

When I said that, she threw a slap on my face with her small hand.

“Even if you won, that doesn’t mean that everything is okay!”

Her words struck me like a broken glass. I can sense that she really was worried about me. I have no words to say. All I could do is to apologize.

“Did you ever think about the people who care about you? Leaving the fact that I would die if you died, a lot of people would become sad if you did. You also have a daughter, please don’t forget about her.”

“I’m sorry.”

“If you’re really sorry, prove it!”

Since she’s really short, I have to look down at her.

Leaving that aside, she’s really looking at me with a stern expression with tears on the edge of her eyes. And as a man such as myself, I wiped those tears away with my hands.

After that, heeding her words, I proved my sincerity to her words by kneeling down on one knee while holding her hand. Because of that, her eyes grew in surprise with her cheeks slowly gets dyed in crimson.

“Cherlaine Relyzine Goldenbloom, my actions have caused you and to the others to become distressed, and for that, I apologize from the bottom of my heart.”

When she heard that, her body shakes in embarrassment and her eyes flies around trying to evade my gaze. It seems that she didn’t expect me to do something so heartfelt that she doesn’t know what to do next.

“Uhm… R-right, I-I accept you-you’re apology, b-but that doesn’t mean t-that I forgive you ju-just like that!”

She’s so nervous that she’s fumbling her words. It’s cute.

Because of her actions, I inadvertently pulled her towards me and hugged her. After that, I put my lips on hers and hugged her even tighter.

Since it was too sudden for her, she kept hitting me. But to every second that passes, those hits became softer and softer as it gradually changes into a grip on my bandages then pulls me towards her like she doesn’t want to let go.

When I pull myself away from her, a silver thread was formed as we let out clouds of warm breaths.

When I look at her eyes, I could see myself for some reason.

Wait, there’s no way I don’t know about this. I fully know this and decided to ignore it the whole time.

-I already love her.

But I won’t say it.

If I say it, I don’t know what would happen if I did.

It’s like if I did say it, something bad would surely happen.

While I was thinking that, Cherry grabbed my cheeks with her hands and made me look straight at her.

“I, I want you… to give--!”

I don’t know what she was about to say but all of a sudden, he mouth was blocked by a familiar hand. After that, she was forcefully pulled away from me.

“It’s my turn!”

It was Matt. And after she successfully pulled Cherry away from me, she pushed me down on the floor and put her lips and invaded my mouth with her tongue. Tastes like coffee.

I think she forgot that I’m still recovering. She’s putting her weight on me especially from her chest. Not only that they feel really soft, they’re marshmallow soft. And because of that sensation, I instinctively grabbed her butt.

Calm down my dear hands!

When I did that, I could feel Matt twitch from all over her body.

“W-wait a second! You destroyed the mood I tried to build Matilda!”

Even though Cherry’s complaining loudly which could surprise anyone why Marie hasn’t woken up from that, Matt ignored her like a gentle breeze.

After removing her lips from mine, she looks at me with a very happy yet exasperated expression.

“I was worried too, you know. Why did you ignore me like that and create your own world?”

“I’m sorry? *boof!*”

When I apologized, Matt suddenly punched me on my stomach. After that, she kissed me again. But this time, tears also fall from her eyes.

“I thought that you’d die back there!”

And once again, I couldn’t speak to a girl in tears.

When I sit up, I pat her head and caressed her green lustrous hair.

Seems that Cherry can read the atmosphere, she kept her silence and watched us with a warm expression—

“So this is what you look like when you cry huh.”

…. I take it all back.

It seems that she’s really amused of Matt’s current crying face which is considered to be a first to be seen by us. But why does she look like she looking at someone pathetic?

I can sense a fight boiling here. Better stop it before it becomes bad.

“To the both of you, I really appreciate that you’re both worried, but for now, can I go to the kitchen? I’m very hungry since I haven’t eaten for days.”

When I said that, both looked at me with a dumbfounded expression. And then after that, both burst into laughter.

Though Marie has woken up because of that, she’s happy that she finally sees me also awake. I’m very blessed to have a cute daughter like her.

After this night, everyone became at ease and we had a midnight party waking the others.

And the next day after that, an expected but unexpectedly visitor visited me.